Recurrence
by sdbubbles
Summary: After Hanssen gives her a place to stay for the night, he discovers there is more to Serena Campbell than the exterior she has created for herself.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This is a new one that came to me this morning (ill again) while I was lazing around the house, extremely bored.**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen strode down the corridor towards the lift, for once more than ready to go home. He was beginning to find that he was sick of the sight of this place by the time five o'clock came. Between Tara Lo's ever-growing brain tumour, Serena Campbell's impending wrath over her mother's stroke and Jac Naylor hiding whatever it was she was hiding, abusing junior doctors and nurses alike, those three women alone were enough to drive him to the brink of insanity at times.

He walked into the lift to find Serena Campbell frantically looking through her pockets and her handbag. "Lost something?" he asked.

"My keys. Both sets. Brilliant," she sighed. "And Eleanor, of course, is at her father's. Locked out of my house and locked out of my car. This is a lovely end to the day," she rambled on. Hanssen had to suppress a smile; for such an intelligent woman, she could be rather dimwitted at times.

"So, in essence, you have no means of getting home, and even if you did, you wouldn't be able to get in?" he surmised her rant for her.

"Yes," she snapped. "Eleanor's got the spare key."

"Call her and ask her for it," Henrik suggested, trying to help her out of the situation she found herself stuck in.

"And admit to my ex-husband I'm an idiot?!" she demanded incredulously. "I don't think so!"

"So stubborn pride is going to keep you out of your own home?" he asked her, not believing there was this childish side to Serena Campbell.

"I don't care if you think I'm being stupid," she asserted as the lift doors opened. "If you knew him, you'd see why I don't want to give him the satisfaction." She stepped out and Hanssen found himself following her, keeping in step with her.

"I don't think you're being stupid," he told her. "I was going to make an offer."

She stopped dead, turning to look up at him. He looked down at her face and watched her become slightly nervous. "Go on," she ordered, and he heard the suspicion in her voice; he found it amusing that she was already distrustful of him.

"Stay at my house tonight," he offered. To him, it was simple; she had nowhere to stay, no access to her car and was too proud to ask her daughter for help.

"What?!" she replied.

"Stay at my house tonight," he repeated. "It's after five o'clock, Ms. Campbell. Do you really want to play phone tag, looking for a locksmith all night?" he reminded her that it would have been hellish to get hold of someone to smooth it all out at this time.

"You know I'm not in the mood for _phone tag_," she sneered. She tried to out-stare him, but he won, and she finally gave in. "Fine. Thank you."

He walked her to his car, unlocking it so she could get in. The silence was awkward; they couldn't really be described as the best of friends. Though Hanssen remembered when he once found Serena amusing. And, of course, charmingly devious – that was the reason he'd hired her in the first place. But after all that happened, after he left to attend to matters in Sweden, he'd found Serena had taken his position in the hospital. And that wasn't pleasant.

She was sat next to him, staring out the window as he drove the familiar route home. "What would you like for dinner?" he asked, remembering neither of them had eaten properly all day. They'd both been at meeting after meeting, both living off coffee and getting on each others' nerves.

"What?" she asked, turning to face him. She seemed to take a second to process his question before she answered him. "I don't know. Whatever you were going to have."

"Let's think about this logically," he decided, knowing it would wind her up. "First, can either of us be bothered to actually cook tonight?" he asked, briefly looking round to see her face. Her look of distaste answered his question. "I didn't think so. Which, of course, leaves a takeaway of some description."

"You, eating a takeaway?" she snorted.

"Is there something you find funny about that?" he asked, intrigued as to what Serena thought of him. He wasn't sure of her anymore; when he'd first hired her, he'd known from her references that she was ambitious and charming, with a wicked sense of humour. What they'd left out was that she had it in her to scheme her way into a higher position.

"Just didn't think you were a takeaway kinda guy," she replied.

"Believe it or not, Ms. Campbell," he began, forcing back a smile., "there are nights where I, like many other people, would rather have someone cook for me. So, what would you like to eat?"

"I don't know," she said again. "Good old-fashioned fish and chips?" she suggested. Hanssen thought for a second; eating from a paper was less than dignified. But if she was doing it too, what was the problem?

"Good. At least we have that decided," he said, pulling over and getting his wallet out when he got to the takeaway. Serena pushed his hand down; her hands were warmer than he'd been expecting.

"I'll pay for it. Least I can do," she said. She got out of the car before he could stop her. He looked down at his hand briefly. This was why he never let people touch him. He always wondered what the purpose of it was. He'd seen Serena do it to others before; in that sense, she was more loving than she let on. He'd seen her with the younger members of staff, touching their arm or shoulder in an almost maternal fashion. Then, of course, she proceeded to scare them senseless.

She was not a bad person. He gave her that much. She just had two enormous flaws: excessively manipulative ambition and a tendency to show nothing more or less than aggression when she was vulnerable.

Before he knew it, she returned with a paper bag and put her seatbelt on. He drove the rest of the way home silently, resisting the urge to spark a conversation with her. For whatever else she was, he had to admit she was good company. She was renowned throughout the hospital for her smart comments and wide smile.

As far as Hanssen knew, even Michael Spence had taken to her in his absence. It made him rather glad he'd posted her down to AAU before he left. Punishment had only been one part of his decision, though he had definitely wanted to penalise her. He knew, in the back of his mind, that Serena and Michael would come out as friends. After all, what use were two brilliant consultants when they were at each others' throats?

He parked outside his house, taking Serena's handbag while she took the food. He unlocked the door, put the light on and bent down to take off his shoes, a routine he'd followed most of his life. He felt a hand on his back suddenly, hearing a tiny yelp from behind. "Sorry," he heard Serena say. "Tripped."

Her hand came off his back to shut the door, leaving a strange warmth in his body. The idea of someone physically relying on him to keep them standing was unknown to him. Taking the paper bag from her, setting her handbag down, he headed to the kitchen for wine. He had a feeling Serena Campbell and alcohol was not a wise combination, but he was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.

He sat down next to her on the sofa, placing the glasses on the coffee table and pouring wine into each one. He handed her a glass and a paper packet. "Thanks," she said. Was she _nervous_? She had an odd pink tinge about her cheeks, and a sparkle in her dark eyes he'd never seen before. "So," she said. "This is where you live."

"Yes," he said, swallowing a mouthful of battered fish. He watched her survey her surroundings, her eyes taking in the light walls, the open space. The wall-hanging fire. The contrasting black glass table and pale wooden floor. She looked out the door to the wide hallway and staircase, and the glass paned doors.

"Are you claustrophobic?" she asked, and he nearly choked on his food.

"Excuse me?" he replied, taking a drink of wine to clear his throat and cloud his mind. "What on Earth would give you that impression?"

"Your house," she shrugged, drinking from her glass. "It's very light and open. I just thought you maybe don't like being enclosed, or feeling trapped."

"I don't," he replied, honesty coming from him for the first time in a long time. "But I wouldn't class myself as claustrophobic." She was smiling into her glass, leaving him to wonder what she was really thinking.

"There are no pictures," she stated. "No photographs."

"Your powers of observation are unearthly, Ms. Campbell," he quipped.

"Why, though?" she asked, and he was becoming wary of her asking such personal questions. She filled her glass again, and his, and returned to her food. "Why don't you have any photos?"

"I don't have any," he answered. It was almost true – he had a couple of Maja, and a few of his mother, none of them easy to look at and none of them he was likely to hang on the wall.

"You must do," she argued. He'd known the wine was a bad idea. "Everyone has photos."

"Not me," he insisted. They sat in silence yet again, but it was not awkward anymore. It was...peaceful. He thought the alcohol must have relaxed her a little. And he was glad she'd stopped with the random questions. _Claustrophobic_? Where had that come from? When had he displayed anything that she could have construed as claustrophobia?

He finished his dinner and folded the paper neatly, hearing Serena scrunch hers into a knot. He took it from her, and handed her the television remote. "I do not want to hear heavy metal music," he warned her, and her face broke out into a grin. He was, of course, joking. He knew Serena well enough to know heavy metal music would not appeal to her.

He scoured the freezer for something sweet, feeling she probably needed something extra to eat to counteract the alcohol. He found some chocolate ice cream and scooped some into two bowls, returning to find Serena leaning back, watching the news. He sat down next to her, handing her a bowl of ice cream.

"_You_ are not good for my waistline," she scolded, tapping his stomach lightly. He flinched slightly before realising the alcohol had finally gone to her head and she was being playful. Once he figured that out, it was really quite endearing.

"There is nothing wrong with your waistline," he replied. Her head whipped around and she gave him a funny look before she returned her gaze to the television. What had he done wrong this time?

They sat there for a good three hours before he noticed Serena start to drop off. It was ten o'clock before he had to wake her up. "Ms. Campbell," he said, shaking her shoulder lightly. She stirred and turned her head. "Time for bed, I think."

"Did I fall asleep?" she asked, her hand running through her hair.

"Yes," he said. She got to her feet to wake herself up, and he decided what the sleeping arrangements would be. "You can take my bed tonight, and I will sleep here."

"On the sofa?" she asked disbelievingly.

"Yes," he said. He led her to his bedroom, going into his drawers for a pair of pyjamas for himself, and a shirt for Serena to wear to bed rather than her work clothes.

"You're nicer than I thought you'd be," she announced into the silence of his bedroom. He turned and handed her his shirt, not really knowing how to reply to being told he was _nice_. It wasn't a word often used to describe him. "Thank you," she said as she took it into her small hands.

"Goodnight, Ms. Campbell," he said, meeting her eyes. There was something different to her when she was relaxed. Something more human than usual. Something that told him that, though she had the whole world thinking she was unbreakable, she was actually a gentle, funny, affectionate woman. She'd shown him that much tonight; he was just glad she hadn't made him regret becoming her saving grace tonight.

She stretched up and kissed his cheek, and replied, "Goodnight." He felt the blood rush to his cheeks as he turned away, leaving the door slightly ajar.

* * *

**Hope this is alright!  
Please feel free to leave a review and tell me your thoughts!  
Sarah x**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: I know it's insane o'clock but I couldn't sleep :( so here's the product of my mad imagination and my inability to sleep (I think those two issues may be connected). And thank you for all the wonderful reviews for the first chapter.**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen woke when he heard a noise in his house. It was coming from upstairs, and it took him a moment for him to remember Serena Campbell was sleeping in his bed tonight. It was being muffled by the closed living room door but it sounded like..._screaming_? "Oh, God," he muttered, getting to his feet quickly.

He picked up the empty wine bottle as a precaution and threw the door open, running up the stairs. It was definitely screaming, and Serena was definitely doing the screaming. He opened his bedroom door. The moonlight was sweeping the room, and it was empty, aside from Serena. She was shrieking in the bed; the noise was going right through Hanssen. He hated the sound of her terror.

He knelt down and shook her gently. "Ms. Campbell," he said, but she wasn't waking. She was still screaming, her arms protecting her head. He took her wrists so she didn't accidentally hit him. "Ms. Campbell!" said Hanssen again; what was he meant to do? She wasn't waking for him. "_Serena_!" he shouted her first name, hoping to get a response that wasn't an ear-splitting, heart-wrenching cry, but it was unsuccessful.

He reached down for her face, tapping it lightly. He could feel her cheeks were wet; she was crying in her sleep. This had to stop, but he couldn't wake her. "Serena!" he shouted. "Wake up!"

She woke up suddenly, and she flew away from him. "Are you alright?" he immediately asked. He instantly felt like an idiot. Of course she wasn't alright. She'd just been crying and shrieking in her sleep. "Nightmare?" he said, sitting down on the bed. He reached over and turned the bedside lamp on to see her ghostly face.

She nodded in answer to his question. "You'd think I'd be used to it by now," she admitted. "Obviously not though."

"Why would you be used to it?" he enquired, not understanding what was going on. She crawled back over to him, pulling the duvet over her legs. She was very warm, like she was overheating. She looked guarded. Uncertain. "Ms. Campbell?" he asked, returning to his more formal way of addressing her.

"Mr. Hanssen?" she replied sarcastically. It was clear to him he wasn't going to get very far here. She was too upset and too cautious of him to tell him what she'd meant by what she had just said.

"Well, I'm going to sleep here tonight, I think," he asserted to her, surprised by how much he actually cared about her. He didn't want her to feel alone and start having nightmares again. He knew himself that he was always terrified of going back to sleep after the very few times he'd experienced a nightmare. He could only imagine the fear she must have felt to scream like that.

"In this bed?"

"Yes."

"With me?"

"Yes."

"You wouldn't dare," she challenged.

"Believe me, I would," he retorted. She just stared at him, like she couldn't believe what she was hearing. Contrary to popular belief, he was not a cold monster. And he didn't want to leave her alone in case the nightmare she had started up again through the night.

"No funny business," she warned him, her tone flatly lethal.

"Wouldn't dream of it," he replied, and he could feel a smirk playing on his lips. Her face broke into a weak, tired smile as he walked around the bed, climbing in the other side next to her. He wasn't quite sure why he even cared about her, really. She'd crossed him too many times for him to feel anything for her, and yet he hated the thought of leaving her alone in case she dreamt something awful again.

She turned the lamp off and pulled the duvet up to her chin. He could hear her breathing begin to even out again, and her kept moving, trying to get comfortable. He didn't need to face her to know what she was doing. "I'm sorry," he heard her whisper.

"What on Earth for?" he replied, confused as to why she felt the need to apologise.

"Waking you up," she said.

He turned around to face her. "Don't be absurd."

She turned to face him too, so they were lying face to face. "I'm not," she answered back. He found himself fighting the urge to laugh. She could be childlike when she let go of the stresses of work. They way she'd kissed his cheek tonight had been so innocent – the one thing he knew she wasn't. The way she'd pulled the duvet over herself was so immature, going against how she tended to act in front of him. She always seemed either angry or devious, but he'd seen the infantile side to her tonight.

"Why did you have that nightmare?" he whispered into the darkness. Her words were playing on his mind; she'd said she should have been used to it. What did that mean?

"I don't know," she responded, but he could tell from her tone that she was lying. He could feel her body heat up and her breath catch as she said it, and he knew he wouldn't have been lying in bed with her had she not been scared to go back to sleep alone. He had an unpleasant feeling that she faced sleep alone after one of these nightmares all too often.

"Don't lie to me, Ms. Campbell," he said. "The noise that came out of you was enough to wake the dead. You must know what's causing it." He heard her inhale sharply. Whether it was out of impatience or fear, he wasn't sure.

"I'm not," she said.

"You are. I don't even need to see your face to know when you're lying to me," he reminded her.

He felt the bed move a little as she shifted her position. She seemed unable to get comfortable, constantly tossing and turning. "When I was a little girl, my dad had a 1967 Ford Cortina," she stated. Her breath was sweet as she spoke; it smelled of wine and chocolate from earlier. "When I was nine years old, he was driving me into town to get my hair cut. We lived in a village, couple of miles from the nearest big town."

"Sounds nice," he commented.

"It was. I wasn't," she confessed. "I was being a bit of a brat, shouting that my hair was fine the way it was, demanding Dad took me back, etcetera, etcetera."

"Not much has changed then," he smirked, and he knew she was going to ignore that comment.

"There I was, throwing a tantrum over my bloody hair," she continued, "and the brakes failed. Straight into a wall. I was lucky to have survived it."

"Your father, I take it, was not so fortunate?" Hanssen asked, feeling awful for her.

"It was before the time of collapsible steering columns," she explained. "Before they became commonplace, anyway. He got both barrels, so to speak. Impaled by the steering column, chest crushed by the steering wheel. He didn't stand a chance," she whimpered. He was starting to think this was the first time she'd spoken about this; if she'd told this story before, she would not have been so raw about it. "I can remember the shaft in his chest, and not being able to move to get to him."

"I'm sorry," he whispered, fighting back the unexpected tears at her story. It was dark, and he couldn't see her face, but her voice told him she was crying. It was broken and thick with tears.

"Thirty-five years have passed and I still have nightmares about it," she admitted. He moved his hand under the duvet, touching her arm lightly. He traced his fingers down her arm until he reached her hand, and took it in his. He rubbed his thumb gently on the back of her hand, wanting her to know that he was next to her if she needed him.

"You've never spoken about this, have you?" he asked her, keeping his voice low.

"Police statement," she replied. "After that, nobody got a word out of me about it. Not even my mum."

"Is it a recurring nightmare you have about it?" he said.

"Yeah," she sniffed. "Yeah, same every time. I'll never get rid of it. It's just the memory of what happened playing itself over in my mind."

"Even after all those years," he sighed. For some bizarre reason or another, he just wanted to put his arms around her and tell her it was alright. She was a woman who had created a front for herself, a barrier of sarcasm, anger and frightfulness, but had just revealed that she'd watched her dad die right before her eyes as a child.

She moved her fingers, linking them with his, and he wondered what she was thinking. What she was feeling. He had some idea – his mother, after all, had committed suicide when he was a child, walking into the lake outside their home. It had not been a rough, violent end like Serena's father had met, but traumatic in the sense Henrik knew his mother actually wanted to die. That she'd killed herself in the knowledge her husband was missing, leaving her child with nobody, had hurt Henrik more than he cared to admit.

So, yes, he did know the pain Serena felt. Thankfully, he didn't face nightmares like she did, every night, it seemed. He had the odd dream about it, but he thought he was capable of reigning it in most of the time.

The other difference, too, was that it sound like Serena herself had nearly died in that crash but lived while her dad was killed. Survivor's guilt. "I do understand," he said against his better judgement.

"Why? What happened?" she immediately replied.

"When I was a child, my mother committed suicide," he revealed, and he heard her stop breathing just for a moment. "I do understand what it is to lose a parent so young," he repeated.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered, just like he had done. Suicide didn't take much of a description, in Hanssen's eyes; it was what it was. His mother had deliberately ended her life for whatever reason. He felt her reach out, and pull him into an awkward one-armed hug with her free arm, their fingers still interlocked.

Because it was dark, he had no idea how close together they were, or how dangerous the water he was treading was. He could feel her hand on his back and she pulled the top section of his body close to her as a comfort he suspected was both for him and for herself. It was all he could do to put his other arm around her clumsily, completely clueless about this type of situation. He rubbed her back lightly for a moment before letting her go, pulling back from her when he realised he could feel her heart beating against his chest.

He didn't separate their hands; he felt she needed that comfort still, and hoped she may not dream that same terrible dream with a hand to hold. "Goodnight, Henrik," she whispered.

"Goodnight...Serena," he replied, bringing himself to use her first name.

She fell asleep quite quickly, he thought. After a few minutes, her breathing had slowed and her hand felt limp in his, though he would not let it go. What he found intriguing was the her body was subconsciously moving slowly towards his, like he was some sort of defender, someone to keep her safe.

Before he knew it, her body was dangerously close to his. Close enough that she would probably be horrified in the morning. At that moment, though, it was irrelevant. He could barely believe she'd opened up to him. She'd said herself that no-one had ever got her to talk about it until now, disregarding the police statement she would have had to make. Why had she opened herself up to him, when she was in such a vulnerable position? It wasn't what she would normally have done. He'd expected a glare and warned to shut up, not the truth about why she'd had a recurring nightmare for the last thirty-five years.

He's been right before – childlike. She was childlike. When she was hurt and vulnerable, when her guard had been shattered on the floor or voluntarily dropped, she could be like a child. It was adorable. Not a word he'd ever have used to describe Serena Campbell before tonight, but true all the same.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me what you thought!  
Sarah x**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: The start of this is probably a bit sappy, but oh well :) and thanks for reviewing, people. Love you all :D  
**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen woke when the sun started to shine through the curtains; looking at the clock, he saw it was quarter to seven. He felt a warm body stuck to his, and the events of last night quickly replayed themselves in his mind. In particular, the sounds of Serena's screaming troubled him. He'd hated her sounding so terrified and broken. When did he start to actually care about Serena Campbell?

He was almost amused to find her arms were wrapped around his waist, her face pressed into his chest. It also, however, made him feel slightly uncomfortable. She had clung to him in her sleep and, even more disturbingly, his subconscious had allowed her. Judging by the way his arm was draped over her, he'd embraced her, even. That concept was pretty foreign to him, after so many years on his own.

He revelled in the way she was not hard and cold. She was soft and warm when she was sleeping. Their legs were tangled, not helped by the length of his, her bare legs somehow caught up in his. He'd forgotten that she was sleeping in only a shirt.

He gently brushed her hair out of her face, tracing the soft line of her cheekbone lightly with the tip of his finger. He'd always liked the softness of her face; it contrasted with the harshness of her dark eyes. He liked that her face was beautiful but soft. She was sort of the opposite of Jac Naylor, whose face, though equally beautiful, was angular and threatening, her eyes completely defensive. Serena's features were whatever she wanted them to be.

He'd never truly appreciated her beauty before, perhaps because the ugliness that came of out of her mouth half the time distracted him from it. But here, while she was sleeping, while she was silent, she was..._cute_. Childlike, just as he'd thought last night. He couldn't wipe that word from his mind; she seemed to have made quite the impression during her time in his home.

His thumb traced her brow bone, and her nose wrinkled slightly. He smiled to himself, wondering if she was really as nice and pleasant as she'd been last night, or if she had been restraining herself. She'd been good company as they had relaxed on the sofa together, smiling and laughing.

He felt her stir, and took his fingers away from her face. He watched as she opened her eyes, taking in the situation and, when she realised where she was and who she was with, leapt back like he'd struck her with a red hot iron. She looked quite embarrassed; he was starting to think that maybe she hadn't experienced the safe feeling of sleeping next to someone for a while. The same rang true for him, actually.

She looked at him with her dark eyes. "What happened?" she asked suspiciously.

"We slept together," he said simply, not realising the implications of that phrase until a look of ill-disguised shock crossed her face. "No, no," he added hastily. "Not in the way you're thinking. No, we literally slept together. Nightmare, remember?" He added in his mind that had anything other than sleep happened last night, he would not have allowed himself to forget it.

She nodded and pulled the duvet up to her shoulders. How odd. She was self-conscious. Serena Campbell was self-conscious. He'd never have pegged her as the type to hide herself away. "Last night," she began, her voice hoarse. "My nightmares, what I told you. Can we just...keep that between us? It's just because I've never really discussed what happened before and I don't want everyone knowing about it. And I'll keep quiet about your mum," she added.

"That goes without saying," Hanssen replied, his voice lower and gentler than he'd intended. He met her dark eyes, finding that she was obviously confused and panicking slightly about waking up next to him, but there was also a softness in her eyes. He couldn't help but wonder if she was lonely. He'd never seen someone cling to another like she'd done to him.

He got up, and went downstairs, flicking the kettle on. If he was truly honest with himself, he was as confused as she was. He measured out coffee, pouring the water in when it finally boiled. He took the two mugs up the stairs and walked straight into his bedroom, assuming Serena had not left the bed while he was away, but he was wrong; she was standing in nothing more than his shirt, her legs bare, the pale skin of her upper chest revealed by the open top buttons of the shirt and her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

He handed her the coffee; normally he would have been dressed by now, downstairs listening to the early morning news, but he was making an exception in Serena's presence. He got back under the duvet, watching her hesitate before copying his actions.

"I'm sorry," she told him again, the second time in less than eight hours. "For, you know, sort of cuddling into you. It probably made you uncomfortable."

"Don't worry about it," he reassured her. "We cannot control what we do when we sleep."

She smiled her brightest grin, and he had to give her a small smile back as he sipped his coffee. Their feet were touching under the duvet, her naked leg resting squint against his. Her face was absent of any make up, and her eyes were a little red from her night time confessional, and yet, somehow, there was a raw, defenceless beauty about her he'd never seen before. Maybe because she was so obviously nervous, and had opened up to him last night, he was seeing her in a different light. He couldn't place what she was evoking in him, but it wasn't something he had felt for her before.

"You hugged me last night," she informed him of what he already knew; it had been brief, but he had returned her embrace as they had shared their demons. "You're nice," she accused.

"There's no need to sound so surprised, Ms. Campbell," he retorted, feigning hurt at her remark. She just grinned again, drinking from her mug.

"You held my hand," she recounted to him. "When I told you what happened to my dad, you held my hand," she said. He shifted rather uncomfortably; when he'd soothed her last night, he was not counting on her reminding him of it. "I fell asleep holding Henrik Hanssen's hand," she announced slowly. "Do you know what that means?" she said, leaning slightly closer to him as she looked up at his face.

"Enlighten me," he replied.

"It means you are actually _human_."

"Mmm," he uttered, swallowing his coffee. "Well spotted, Ms. Campbell."

"Thank you," she smiled. "I think I deserve a medal!"

"For what?"

"For disproving a well established scientific theory," she answered, her grin only growing wider.

"And which theory is this?"

"The theory that you have an on and off switch, circuit boards and hard drives," she explained. "I can say with total confidence that you sleep, you have a rather warm human body and you have a rather emotional human mind."

All he could do was smirk to himself. There was no answering back to her when she was like this; her confidence had made a miraculous return to her. The sparkle was back in her eyes, ready to face today with a smile as if she hadn't spent last night crying. And for _that_, considering he'd seen for himself what her nights were so often like, he admired her.

She looked at the clock and said, "Time to get ready for work."

"Yes," he agreed, though he could have sat there for a lot longer with her, given the chance. She was good company; her sense of humour really was something else. She seemed to like to tease people.

* * *

By nine o'clock, Hanssen was pulling into the hospital car park. "I'll get out here," Serena said unexpectedly as he turned into the junction. "I don't want stupid questions from Ric and Michael, because they'll never believe nothing actually happened," she explained, and he had to merit the logic in what she was saying as she got out of the car.

He parked in his usual space, next to Serena's temporarily abandoned car, and got out. Michael Spence was passing and was about to say something to him, until there was an Earth shattering noise from behind them. Henrik turned to see a car, rather what was left of the car, crashed into the wall. His immediate reaction was to drop everything and run, Michael quickly mirroring his actions.

Chrissie Levy and Antoine Malick, both presumably arriving for work, were quick to join them. The driver's chest had been crushed, that much was obvious. The steering column had been pushed up too – something told Henrik this car had not been well-maintained – leaving the man behind the wheel bleeding out, an inch from death. The sight reminded him of Serena, and what she'd told him. It was odd that this had happened so soon after him finding out about Serena's father, but it was a coincidence he chose not to dwell on. This crash, judging by the lack of maintenance given to the car, was always going to happen sooner or later.

He remembered Serena was approaching and panicked slightly as he and Malick attended to the man. "Sister Levy," he called. "Ms. Campbell will be coming around that corner any moment," he informed her, nodding towards where Serena was going to appear. "I would like you to make sure she doesn't become involved in this."

"But-" Chrissie began to argue.

"We will be fine without you," he assured her.

"Too late," Chrissie told him as he took the man's almost non-existent pulse. He looked up to find Serena running towards them and groaned internally. "Here she comes."

Hanssen briefly looked up once more, only to see Serena approaching rapidly. He met Malick's eyes, warning him not to say he'd tried to avoid her presence, before saying to Chrissie, "Not a word to Ms. Campbell about what I just said."

"Of course," the blonde nurse replied. Serena appeared behind Malick, a hand resting on the registrar's back as she leaned in to survey the situation from the passenger side. As Hanssen had feared, a rather haunted look flashed across her face.

"What happened?" she asked, and Henrik could tell from her voice she was struggling already to keep her composure.

Michael appeared behind her with a trolley. "We'll have to wait for fire and rescue to cut him out," he announced, pointing out there was no way the five of them could get him out. "And this is a pretty old car, about twenty years old," he added to Serena. "It's obviously not been looked after properly so I assume that's why the collapsing mechanism failed. You see it a lot in the States because we don't have MOT testing like you do," he explained to her.

Henrik looked up at Serena, and silently told her with a look to go before she cracked under the strain of the situation. "I'm fine," she whispered, but he could see that she wasn't. "Go ahead."

He took her at her word and proceeded to gently open the man's shirt from the back seat behind, to find that the extent of the injuries meant he was probably going to be dead before fire and rescue got to them. He heard the sirens approaching from the main road and hoped that perhaps he was wrong, but there was nothing that could really be done; the man wasn't conscious, not for the lack of Malick trying. His pulse was thready and weak, his breathing had all but stopped and he was losing blood at a shocking rate. Not to mention his chest was crushed, too.

"I can't," she whimpered to him, so quiet he wondered whether Malick had heard what she'd said. "I'm sorry."  
"Don't apologise," he told her as she backed away out of the back of the car. Fire and rescue started to take over, and Hanssen stayed to oversee until he was cut out. "Straight to Darwin," he ordered Michael once the man was on the trolley, though he didn't think even Miss Naylor and Mr. Hope could save him; he was too far gone, and it wasn't very often that Henrik resigned himself to that.

He found himself looking around him, scanning the area for Serena, but she was gone. Why, he wasn't sure, but he wanted to find her. He wanted to know she was alright. He thanked Malick and Chrissie and left them, trying to decide whether to go up to his office or begin his search for Serena.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: I don't know how this turned out, really - I'm tired and trying not to murder my brother, so my mind was a bit full writing it. Thank you, as always, to everyone who has read and reviewed :)**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen was practically running up the stairs, after deciding he had to check on Serena, even if it was only to quiet his own conscience. She'd looked like she had seen a ghost. He walked onto Keller Ward, keeping an air of calm around him and asked Ric, "Have you seen Ms. Campbell?"

"You could try her office," Ric shrugged, obviously none the wiser about the way she had reacted to this morning's crash. "I haven't seen her though."

"Thank you," he said, striding off to her office where, of course, she was nowhere to be found. He should have known she wouldn't go the one place he would think to search. She didn't want to be found, but he wanted to find her, just to make sure she was alright. He didn't know why; he'd never really given a damn about her before.

Trust her to hide from him. She would, of course, deny it when he eventually got hold of her. He had a choice – go to the meeting he was due to attend in five minutes, or continue his search. She was clearly more vulnerable than she was telling him. She wouldn't have run off if she wasn't. And he knew what had happened, and the parallels she was seeing. He couldn't just leave her. Not when he knew why. Not when he had had seen the look of horror on her face. His morality wouldn't allow it.

Abandoning any plan he had to attend the meeting, he thought about where she might have gone. The locker room was too obvious, and she would have known that someone she knew was going to come across her. For whatever else the woman was, she wasn't stupid. He would have looked in the pub, but he didn't think she was idiotic enough to drink on duty. At least, he hoped she wasn't.

She wasn't likely going to be on Darwin; she would have known the man would have been taken up to the CT unit. She wasn't going to go to AAU and subject herself to Michael Spence, either; Hanssen knew that, while she'd developed a friendship with the American, he still annoyed her half to death.

So that left the roof, storage rooms and the toilets, the latter being where he had a hunch she would retreat to. He hesitantly entered the third floor bathrooms, relieved to find there was nobody visible to him. "Ms. Campbell?" he called gently.

"Henrik, what the bloody hell are you doing in the women's bathrooms?" he heard Serena's distinctive drawl snap from the locked end cubicle. "Unless there's something you're not telling me," she added, and he could hear her playful voice was slightly broken.

"Hilariously funny," he retorted. "Now, would you like to come out?"

"Not really, no," she admitted.

"I don't bite," he reminded her. "Are you OK?" he asked her, hoping to get her to come out and talk to him.

"I'm fine!"

"If you were fine, Ms. Campbell, you would not be hiding in the toilets like a frightened schoolgirl," he asserted to her. He went to stand at the door of the cubicle. He was determined to get her out of there, despite how stubborn he knew her to be.

"I'm sorry," she unexpectedly said. "I should have done my job and helped you out."

"Nobody would expect you to stay under the circumstances," he told her. "I was going to tell you to go. I told Chrissie Levy to divert you but you had already seen it," he explained, knowing full well she wouldn't like it but also wanting her to know that he actually cared about her.

"You did what?" she demanded, fumbling with the lock on the door. Hanssen smirked; he knew that would get her out – her temper always won out. "What gives _you_ the right to-" she started to shout, but stopped when she, in her temper, walked straight into his chest. He caught her before she could fall back, his hands tight on her soft arms. "What gives you the right to try and protect me?" she asked when she was sure she wasn't going to fall.

"The fact that nobody else will do it," he said. The look of shock upon her face brought a smile to his face. He had forgotten that his hands were still wrapped around her arms, and her eyes were locked with his. She was suddenly warm in his grasp, his strong fingers tight around her arms; she didn't protest, which surprised him, but then she was full of surprises recently. "I have the right to protect anyone I feel needs it," he told her. "And, right now, I feel you need someone."

"Who knew Henrik Hanssen is like a marshmallow under that hard shell?" she teased. He knew she was deflecting, and he had to admit she was as good at it as he was. Too many years of practising, for both of them.

"I am not like a _marshmallow_," he retorted, making her smile at his denial; she was bringing out the side of him he rarely let anyone see. The part of him that actually cared about how certain people felt, and Serena just happened to be one of those certain people. "Why don't you just talk about it, Ms. Campbell?" he asked her, trying to get her to open up about what she had felt at the scene of that crash this morning.

"Because it's nobody's business but mine," she replied. "I shouldn't have even told you last night. I never told my ex-husband, and I have never told Eleanor. My mother hasn't spoken of it to me because I refused to say a word."

He found himself rubbing his thumb against her arm soothingly as she became more and more uptight. "Perhaps the time has come. You have already told me what happened, I know," he said when she opened her mouth to protest, "but you didn't tell me how you feel about it."

"Not just now," she groaned. "Just drop it, hmm?" she suggested. She reached for his arms, and her touch was warm as she pushed against his grip, trying to force him away. "I'll be fine once I get working," she reassured him.

He didn't trust that she was being truthful. She still had that hurt, ghostly look in her eyes she'd had when she saw the state of the driver of the car. He didn't want to let her go when he could see she was far from fine. "Henrik," she whispered. "Please, just let it go."

"No," he answered defiantly. It wasn't often he felt so strongly about someone, but he wasn't willing to let her deal with a shock like that on her own. To be reminded of such a traumatic event was never easy, but when there were so many similarities...he could have sworn, for a moment in that car, he had seen a nine-year-old, terrified little girl watched her dad die all over again.

"Why?"

"I have no clue," he confessed. "I want you to open up because I can tell you need to talk. Why I even care, though, remains a mystery."

"Don't make me deck you," she warned, and he saw that dangerous flash that crossed her eyes when her playfulness came to the surface. As he thought it, though, he realised she probably would deck him if she was irritated enough. Her hand touched his chest lightly, her palm flat, and he could feel himself become nervous. "Your heart," she smirked. "Do I need to rush you up to Darwin, Mr. Hanssen?"

She looked thoroughly pleased that she'd distracted him from her problems, and all she had needed to do was put a hand against his heart. He had always known she was mischievous. Charming. Flirtatious. Beautiful. Wicked. Funny. Ambitious. Devious. Manipulative. A bad idea.

Her hand slid up to his collar bone, her fingers over his shoulder. His grip on her loosened, and she ducked under his arm with a wicked grin before he could stop her. "I believe I have outsmarted you," she smirked, looking rather smug. At least she was smiling. She was tougher than he had credited her for, but he still was unsure as to whether her approach was healthy. It sounded to him that she'd been running from the accident for a long time.

He had expected her to bolt as soon as she was free of him, but she stood still. "Dinner," she said. "Eleanor texted me to say her father is taking her out to the cinema tonight, and she's staying over with him again. So we'd have peace and quiet to...talk, since you're so adamant that I need to. And I found my keys," she added.

"Where were they?"

"Ric found them in his office," she admitted. "They must have fallen out of my pocket."

"You really are something else, Ms. Campbell," he told her, referring to her tendency to forget where she put her belongings, and also to the stroke she had just pulled.

"Why, thank you, Mr. Hanssen," she grinned.

"I didn't say it was a compliment," he reminded her, in a tone more teasing than he had intended.

"I know it is though," she said, confidence radiating from her body. This was the side to Serena he preferred to see. He found her humour intriguing, and was equally fascinated by how she managed to be confident without resorting to cockiness like so many others did. "So, dinner?" she reminded him.

"What time?"

"About seven," she suggested. "My house."

"Alright," he reluctantly agreed, wondering what her motives were. She smiled and turned her back to leave, and Hanssen followed close behind her, managing to get out of the women's toilets unnoticed.

Once they were out, she turned to him, barely a few inches between them. "Thank you for finding me," she said. "I might have stayed there forever if it wasn't for you," she confessed. She touched his hand very lightly, and it sent a strange energy into his fingers.

"You're welcome," he replied. She gave him one last smile and walked away to talk to Malick. Hanssen could see the registrar, too, was worried for Serena. He must have heard her tell him that she couldn't stay with them.

Trusting Malick to look after her if she couldn't handle herself, he went up to his office devising an excuse for missing his meeting. He decided he was going to, if asked, just say he was in a meeting with Serena about the crash; he was sure she would back him up, and it wasn't strictly a lie. It was the truth, taken out of context.

That just left him to worry about what he'd got himself into tonight. Whatever her true motives, there was no doubt that it would be interesting to spend more time with her. She was not someone he would have placed himself in a friendship with, but, out of the work situation, she was charming, intelligent, good company.

He put his head in his hands and sighed to himself, "What have I done?"

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me your thoughts!  
Sarah x**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: So this is a bit soppy and romantic, but I hope you like it. And I'm finding I must be quite the hard arse, since my version of soppy and everyone else's are two totally different things, so don't take my version as yours ;) as always, thank you for the lovely reviews :)**

**Sarah x**

* * *

It was with a huge amount of trepidation that Hanssen knocked on Serena's door, wondering yet again why he had landed himself in this situation. She was not someone he had taken a great liking to, but she was someone different to him today. Today she was not the frightening Ms. Campbell; today she was the soft, childlike Serena he had become so intrigued by.

"Come in, Henrik," she called. He felt slightly uneasy entering her home. He opened the door, and briefly wondered whether she was ready for him or not – he was twenty minutes early, after all.

He found her in the kitchen, barefoot, in a hoodie and sweatpants, head almost in the oven. "Bloody hell!" she shouted, jumping back.

"What?" he asked.

"Burnt my hand!" she complained, wringing it in pain. He had to roll his eyes; he'd been right about her common sense to intelligence ratio. He silently took her hand in his, seeing a straight red line where her hand had obviously hit the rack. When he dragged her to the sink and ran cold water over her hand, she, surprisingly, didn't object.

She looked up at him, her hand still trapped in his, and smiled gently. "Perhaps tonight was another night for a takeaway," he joked.

"Are you trying to get me fat?" she retorted.

"No," he returned. "I'm trying to save you from having to make a trip to the ED," he added with a smirk. She just grinned up at him, her eyes shining bright. He returned his attention to her hand, examining it carefully. "It should be fine. Just watch what you're doing from now on," he suggested. He knew he sounded silly. He didn't know why he was pointing out the obvious; he just couldn't think of what else to say. He felt quite awkward, not helped by the fact he was dressed like he was about to walk into an important meeting, and she was dressed like she planned on lounging about all night. Her pink and grey hooded jumper was not something he had ever expected to see her wear, but he figured even she had to relax sometimes.

She pulled her hand out of his grip and returned to her cooking. It smelled like chicken with cheese and bacon. Comfort food. Serena seemed the type to eat comfort food when she was hurt.

Before he knew it, she had handed him a plate, and picked up hers, a bottle of wine and two glasses, and was leading him to the table. She poured the wine and they ate in silence for a few minutes, Henrik beginning to wonder what the hell he was doing here. Why was he so determined to look after the woman? It wasn't like she was a helpless child who needed taken care of. But that was just it; he was starting to see every piece of her, and that she was both and woman and a child. She was strong and yet, to him, she was strangely helpless.

"Why am I here?" he finally sighed.

"I invited you," she shrugged.

"It's that simple?"

"Yes."

"Nothing is ever that simple," he contradicted her, only realising now how cynical that made him sound.

"It is with me," she answered, eating a forkful of food. "I treat everyone the same until they give me a reason not to," she explained, and he had to admit to himself that, in that sense, yes, she was easy to get along with.

"So I'm here simply because you invited me," he conceded. "Which leads to another question: why did you invite me?" he asked her.

"You're determined to make me open up. Do your worst," she grinned. "Which, of course, leads me to a question of my own: why do you want to know me?"

He remained silent and ate his dinner. The truth was that he had seen a side to her he had never witnessed before. It proved that a good, kind person lay underneath the exterior of cold-heartedness she wore on a daily basis. "You need a friend," he stated bluntly. "And since you're not willing to tell anyone else why you need a friend today, the role falls onto me," he explained. "And you're not bad company."

He hadn't meant to say that aloud, but his nerves had stopped his thought-to-speech filter from working properly. She looked up from her plate curiously. "What happened was a long time ago," she sighed. "I really should get over it."

"It's never as simple as just getting over it, I'm afraid," he told her softly.

"Hmm," she agreed. "Don't I bloody know it."

Her bitterness took him by surprise. "Ms. Campbell-"

"Please don't call me that," she cut him off. "Not in my own home. I don't even think about calling me Rena – Michael Spence seems to have caller dibs on that one," she added, seeming rather unimpressed by her pet name, and the fact Michael had taken to it.

"Serena," he corrected himself. "Nothing I say will detract from the horror of what happened, especially as you were only a child," he told her. "All I can do is listen if and when you feel the need to discuss it. Which, at the moment, you are determined not to do, so I won't push the matter. I'm no masochist," he gave her a tiny smile.

"Why are you being so nice to me?" she demanded suspiciously.

He didn't know how to put it into words, this feeling. It was an odd mix of concern and that, actually, he really did want to get to know her, understand her, be near her, stand by her. "My mother told me a tale when I was a child. A bedtime story of sorts," he began, deciding this was the only way to explain it. She looked at him with an odd kind of interest, like she couldn't see what he was feeling, when he thought what he was feeling for her was perfectly clear.

"There was a woman, who did everything alone, who refused to let anyone help her or love her. She was so scared of showing weakness, so terrified of her vulnerabilities being exploited, that she never let anyone get close to her, scaring everyone off with her sharp tongue and fearsome temperament," he continued. She looked down into her plate, her chicken and bacon suddenly very interesting, but he carried on regardless. "She was so ferocious that everyone in the land was frightened of her, leaving her no choice but to walk alone and fight her battles on her own. She was strong and intelligent, and beautiful, but her temper was the stuff horror stories were made from. She was proud, and she was brave, never letting her surroundings or obstacles overcome her."

She glared at him, but it was soft and nervous, the opposite of the Serena Campbell the rest of the world knew. "But one night, it was cold and dark, and she was lost in a town she didn't know. A man gave her shelter, letting her eat, drink and sleep in his home. He had heard the stories of her wrath, but wasn't scared of her. He found she was not who she pretended to be. She was a force to be reckoned with, yes, and treated with caution at times, but there was nothing to fear from her," he smiled. She rested her chin in her hands, elbows propped up on the table, just gazing intently at him.

"As the night went on and her barriers slowly fell, he discovered that she was warm and kind, funny and vibrant, intelligent and fascinating. He realised she was not the hellish demon everyone warned one another of, but was a truly beautiful woman," he continued, and Serena let a smile form across her lips.

"Later into the night, her guard collapsed completely, and she allowed him to hear the darkest times she had faced. The man could tell she was more vulnerable than she allowed to show and that she had faced down her demons alone for far too long. He realised she was a strange combination of a woman and a child, and there was still a little girl in her who wanted nothing more than to have someone who would be there for her." Serena looked into his face, looking quite confused by what he was saying, but was still listening with interest.

"That night, the man swore to himself that he would never let her stand alone again. He vowed that, no matter what battles and monsters she encountered, he would be with her if she needed him. From then on, the woman and the man stood together, and kept each other on the straight and narrow, because both had been dangerously close to taking a road that led to nothing more or less than loneliness. They were stronger together than they were individually, and the man made certain that she never had to face her demons alone again," he concluded. She was openly smiling now, and he was pleased he could make her smile. It was the most beautiful thing about her.

"Did your mother really tell you that?" she asked sceptically, an eyebrow raised.

"No," he confessed. "But it made it easier to say."

"Well, I think it's lovely," she commented simply. She put her hand on his and lifted their hands together, intertwining their fingers with a soft smile he had never seen her use before.

Her smile left him perplexed and puzzled. He had never been very good at reading people, particularly women. Very good at hiding his own feelings, definitely, but deciphering a woman had never been his strong point. In a way, he was lucky his top consultants were Jac and Serena – they had women's intuition but displayed male logic most of the time, which was a great relief to him.

They were quiet as they finished their dinner, and Henrik could only sit and watch when Serena refused to let him wash his plate. He carefully and silently walked into the kitchen, standing behind her. She didn't notice his presence, and turned, again, straight into his chest. "Either you need to stop doing that, or I need to look where I'm going," she announced.

"Doing what?" he asked, not sure to what she was referring.

"Looming," she smiled. Her hands were still went from washing the dishes, leaving hand prints on his chest from when he had steadied herself on his body. The sensation her touch left on his skin, he believed, he would never get used to. "And so it begins," she sighed, although she sounded quite happy and content.

"And so it begins," he conceded, knowing exactly what she meant. She was talking about the way he felt, and the way she obviously was feeling too. He leaned down towards her, gauging her reaction, ready to move away if she flinched. She didn't though, and his heart started to beat too hard and fast. He kissed her gently, giving her ample opportunity to put a stop to it; instead, her hands moved up his chest and she put her arms around his neck, letting his wrap his around her waist.

Her breath tasted of wine – they probably had both had slightly too much – but he knew she was well aware of her actions. What he felt now, he could never have expected; she was no longer Ms. Campbell, the adversary forced upon him, but Serena, the woman who had bared her most difficult vulnerabilities to him. He felt slightly dizzy, feeling his pulse in his head. He broke the kiss and looked into her eyes as he attempted to work out what she was thinking.

She finally spoke, and he was relieved to see it was with a smile that she confessed, "I think I might pass out after that."

"Sorry," was his first reaction. She started laughing, her forehead leaning on his chest. What did she find so funny this time?

"I meant it in a good way, you moron," she chuckled into his chest. "And by the sound of your heart, you might pass out next to me," she joked when she heart the rate at which his heart was beating. She placed a hand on her chest, still in his arms, and smiled at the effect she was having on him. She touched his lips with her thumb, and the rational coward in him decided enough was enough. For tonight, at least.

"I should go," he told her quietly.

"Of course," she sighed. "This is wrong, isn't it?"

"It's only wrong if we let ourselves think it is," he reasoned; he pressed a kiss into her hair, picked up his keys and his coat and turned to face her. He kissed her softly once more and said, "Goodnight, Serena."

Her fingers brushed his cheek lightly and she replied, "Goodnight, Henrik." She released him and allowed him to leave. By the time he got to his car, his head was in the clouds. As he turned the ignition of his car, he came to the conclusion that he was an idiot. All the same, he was starting to wonder if, just maybe, he could have allowed himself to fall for Serena Campbell.

* * *

**Hope this is alright!  
Please feel free to leave a review and tell me what you thought!  
Sarah x**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Sorry this took so long to update; I couldn't decide which way was best to go with it. The rest of my stories are having pretty much the same issues, and it's driving me slightly demented. This chapter includes Malick, Chantelle and Digby, too. Again, thank you for all your kind comments :)**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen stepped onto Keller Ward, having been paged by Antoine Malick, who was standing at the nurses' station talking to an oddly troubled-looking Chantelle Lane. He groaned inwardly; what had gone wrong _now_?

"Good morning, Mr. Hanssen!" Chantelle greeted him cheerily, in a tone that, as always, contradicted the slightly gloomy expression upon her face.

"Good morning, Nurse Lane," he replied politely. "You paged me?" he reminded Malick, who was looking just as confused and pestered as Chantelle was.

"Ms. Campbell," he said simply.

"What about her?" Henrik said, worrying in a slight panic that she'd let slip about their past two evenings together. Had she told Malick and Chantelle? Were they about to tell him to back off from Serena? Despite its troubles, Henrik knew Keller was quite a tight-knit ward, where everyone, either openly or secretly, looked out for each other.

"Is she OK? This is the second day in a row her head's been up in the clouds somewhere," he explained. "It's not like her."

"What exactly are you referring to?" Hanssen quizzed them.

Chantelle answered quickly, "Well, she was in the toilets yesterday morning, and I went after her and she said she was fine but she sounded like she wanted to cry. And then she let both Gemma _and_ Arthur in theatre with her. _Two_ F1s, Mr. Hanssen! And then she put salt in her coffee by accident and we all know how picky she is about her coffee, and then this morning she was actually being nice to Mr. Griffin and Arthur, at the same time. She didn't even glare at Arthur when he accidentally said something about her hair being shiny! And then I lost my purse this morning and she lent me money until I got it all sorted, which she normally would never do. She bought me and Jake and Arthur and Mr. Griffin and Malick coffee, which she would never do either, and, well, she's being _nice_, Mr. Hanssen!" she finally concluded her breathless, rambling version of events.

"And she's not Serena Campbell if she's that nice," Malick backed Chantelle up. Hanssen didn't say anything, and Malick persisted, "Come on! Since when did Serena start being nice to F1s?!"

Malick and Chantelle, of course, were right to be worried. Normally, it was time to worry if someone was unusually unpleasant. But with Serena, there was more likely to be an issue if she was being pleasant. "OK," he sighed. "Although I don't understand why you think I am the person to talk to about this."

"I saw you get her out of the bathroom yesterday," Malick confessed. "Chantelle didn't manage it, so she obviously listens to you."

Slightly unnerved that someone had witness their exchange outside the bathrooms yesterday, Henrik answered, "I fear your confidence in me may be misplaced." But then he looked at Chantelle, and her genuinely worried expression, and he had to resist the urge to roll his eyes at her wounded puppy expression. "Alright," he groaned. "I will talk to her, but I warn you, I am no miracle worker," he added sternly to them both.

He walked away, not giving them a chance to answer him back, and decided Serena would be in her office. As he knocked on her door, he smiled to himself at her backward nature. "Come in!" she called, and he opened the door. "Ah, Mr. Hanssen," she smiled, but he saw the uncertainty in her eyes. Had he gone a step too far in kissing her last night? "How can I help?"

"I have it on good authority that you are being _nice_," he told her, unable to keep the layer of amusement out of his voice.

"There's no need to sound so surprised Mr. Hanssen," she retorted, relaying his own words back to him with a smirk. "I _am_ capable of it, you know."

He went to stand at the side of her desk, looking down on her, now seeing what was worrying Malick and Chantelle. "Are you alright?" he asked her gently. "Apparently, your mind is all over the place."

"Let me guess," she drawled, her smile turning into an amused sneer. "Nurse Lane and Mr. Malick?" He didn't have to answer for her to know who had grassed her up. "Well, at least I know someone cares about me."

"Don't be silly," he scolded her gently. "You know the people here care about you. It's just unfortunate that you frighten most of them half to death," he added, and she smiled again. He had to take it in for a moment; he was only just realising that she was charming in a way he had never encountered before. "Did I upset you?" he sighed.

"What?" she asked; it appeared that he had confused her.

"Last night," he clarified, remembering her expression when he backwardly told her why he was making an effort with her, and her words after he kissed her. Her forehead leaning against her chest, laughing at his social ineptitude. The nervous sparkle in her eyes. "Did I upset you last night?"

She looked down to her fidgeting hands with a sheepish smile. "No, you didn't upset me," she assured him, still smiling like she was embarrassed, still fidgeting. Serena didn't fidget. Until now. She finally looked up at him, and what he saw was not what he had been expecting; she looked like she wanted to say something but didn't know how to put it.

He took her hand gently, trying to encourage her to spit it out. "You know I said I should be over what happened to my father?" she said.

"Yes," he replied. "I also recall that you have by no means recovered from what happened to you and your father," he said as he sat on the edge of the desk next to her.

"I don't want to talk about it," she said. "But I think I need to." Henrik smiled sadly down on her, knowing all too well how difficult it was to talk about the death of a parent at such a young age. "Maybe it keeps haunting me because I haven't talked to anyone about it. My own mother couldn't get a word out of me. I spent weeks and weeks, just shell-shocked. Too upset to go to school. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw it all again," she admitted, standing up and running her hands through her hair.

"I remember the car slamming straight into that wall. I nearly went through the windscreen, but my dad had made me put my seatbelt on. I looked around," she said, turning to face him. "And all I saw was him. Just sitting there. Steering column stuck in his chest, steering wheel bruised against him," she continued. He heard the tears in her voice that she was too proud to cry.

"I loved him," she said, and the tears finally flooded over onto her cheeks. "He was my dad, and I loved him, and I watched him die, and I couldn't help him," she finished. Her hand covered her mouth and she started to cry; he suspected this was the first time she had gone into any detail, and the first time she had consciously forced herself to relive it.

He watched her silently for a moment, not sure of what to do. She wasn't the type to embrace pity. Or kindness. Or sympathy. But he couldn't just leave her there crying, could he? "Come here," he sighed, beckoning her over to him. She glared at him, so he persisted, "Just come here."

She stepped over to him, wiping the tears from her cheeks, only for them to be instantly replaced. He put his arms around her, pulling her into a cuddle. He felt her arms wrap around him, her face buried into his neck. He put his hand on the back of her head, stroking her hair lightly. He had known this was coming. He just hadn't known when to expect it.

She was small and delicate in his arms, but still strong. "It's alright," he whispered. "It's alright."

"No, it isn't," she said into his neck. "But it's as OK as I'm going to get." He smiled at her words, her pessimism near equal to his. She stood back up, face to face with him once more, and smiled at him. "Thank you," she said. "For listening. For not telling me I'm an idiot. For just giving me a cuddle when I needed it."

"It's not a problem," he returned. Her hands fell to his shoulders, one creeping up to his neck, her thumb on his cheek. He knew where this was going, and the logical part of his brain was ordering him to stop it before it all went wrong. The other part of him, the part that was falling for the woman before him, was telling him to go ahead, because it was what he wanted.

Before he could make a decision, her lips were on his. His instinctive reaction was the one he willingly followed, deepening the kiss as he stood up, leaning down to her. As he did so, though, that doubtful voice of the cynic berated him. "Is this a good idea?" he asked her, shocked by how little air he had in his lungs.

"Who cares?" was her breathless answer as she drove him backwards into the wall, his back gently pressed against the cold, hard plaster. His answer was to follow his heart; he refused to let his head make him stop kissing her, and let a hand fall to her back, the other gentle but firm on the side of her neck.

Control was slipping away from him; it was a feeling he had not experienced in a long, long time, and he wasn't sure if he liked the idea of the self-imposed shackles being loosened – they were there for a reason. But as her arm wrapped around her neck and her body pressed against his, he thought that maybe this was a good thing.

The harder he kissed her, the faster the chains disappeared. She was taking control from him, making him free himself. He let her do so, up until the point where the sudden freedom frightened him, and he had to regain control. Instead of stopping kissing her, though, because he didn't even want to stop, he took charge, turning their bodies so that neither one was against the wall as they kissed. They were equals, and he had some degree of control.

Her hand was on his side, warm against his skin through his shirt. "We shouldn't be doing this," he reasserted aloud between smothering kisses; her breath was ragged now, and she was losing her willpower as fast as he was. Her free hand was wandering, and he acutely felt her fingers toying with the buttons on his shirt.

"Who says?" she replied. Her voice, though she was out of breath, was smug. Just as her fingers started to undo the first button on his shirt, the door flew open.

"Ms. Campb-" a young man's voice never got to finish her name. They immediately sprung apart, and Henrik looked to the door to see a stunned Arthur Digby with his hand still on the door handle.

"You didn't see a thing," Serena told him. "You weren't even here. Got it?" she glared, making the poor boy extremely nervous.

"I-I'm not good at keeping s-secrets," he stuttered, still shocked over what he had walked in on.

"You had better get good at it, then, hadn't you?" she retorted, her voice deadly serious. "Not a word to _anyone_. And learn to knock."

"Yes, Ms. Campbell," he agreed, walking away.

"Were you born in a barn, Dr. Digby?!" she shouted after him. To Henrik's amusement, within seconds, he returned to shut the door behind him with an apologetic look to them. She turned to Hanssen again, and he couldn't disguise his amusement. He had heard Digby was terrified of Serena. He hadn't realised just how terrified, though.

Their eyes met, and he smiled when she burst out laughing, wrapping her arms around his waist. She stretched up to kiss him, and he kissed her back lightly, just happy to see her demons were not overwhelming her like his had done to him for far too long.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: I enjoyed writing this quite a lot, for some reason :) so I hope you all enjoy it. And thanks for the lovely reviews, as always!**

**Sarah x**

* * *

When Hanssen next looked at the clock in his office, it was three o'clock, and he hadn't even noticed the last five hours pass. What had she done to him? He hated to think what might have happened had Arthur Digby not interrupted. She had made her intentions abundantly clear, and he hadn't tried to stop her.

The way she had kissed him had been so passionate; he had not expected her to do that. It was almost like she had been trying to prove herself to him. He rested his head on his desk, trying to regain control of his thoughts. She had a talent for turning from a defenceless child to a passionate, beautiful woman in the blink of an eye. She had felt fragile in his arms as he had held her while she cried, but then she kissed him and she was suddenly powerful and energising.

It was like a switch that flipped when she decided she wasn't the person she needed to be. It proved to him that she was not the confident, imperturbable person she pretended to the world that she was.

The door opened and he jumped, looking up to find Serena entering. "You OK?" she asked, clearly concerned. "You seemed a bit uncomfortable when you left my office this morning."  
"We were caught in a compromising position by an F1 with a tendency to say things he shouldn't," he reminded her.

She just shrugged. "Like my mother pointed out, he's terrified of me. He wouldn't dare talk about it," she assured him. "You do realise how close we came to...well, you know..." she trailed off, leaving the rest to Henrik's imagination. Yes, he did realise how close they had come to truly crossing a line. One he wasn't even sure either of them really wanted to cross. "We've been invited to a party," she said brightly, obviously attempting to change the subject away from their little situation earlier today.

"No,_ you_ have a party invite," Hanssen corrected her, knowing he was not considered sociable enough to attend these gatherings.

"No, _we_ have a party invite. The whole of Keller, AAU and Darwin wanted to ask you but they're all too chicken," she grinned. "I almost sent Digby to do it," she added, a wicked flash shining in her eyes.

"And they had no problem asking you to go?" he asked disbelievingly.

"Because they know I like to party," she replied. "You, on the other hand, don't seem to know the meaning of the word."

"Oh, good," he retorted sarcastically. "And I'll have you know I do know what a party means."

"Oh, really?" she smiled, arching an eyebrow at him. "When was the last time you went to a party?" she challenged. He thought about it for a moment.

"Does my mother's wake count?"

"Oh, Christ," she moaned. "_Really_?!"

Uncertain why this bothered her, since she'd known all along that socialising wasn't one of his strong points, he answered her, "Yes," he said. "And this upsets you?"

"It upsets me that such a funny, brilliant man has never been shared with the world," she returned with an evil smile. "And don't even bother denying that you are funny." He was a little uncomfortable with her praise; it was something he never really received. Not on a personal level, at least.

He knew what was coming even before she said it. "So. Will you go with me?" she asked. "Our first...date?" she added, a soft smile playing on her lips.

"I thought that was last night?"

"No. That just _happened_," she explained her way of thinking. See, this was why he would never understand women. Why couldn't she just call last night a date, and let him off the hook? "It'll be fun," she said in an attempt to convince him that a party with his subordinates would not be a most painful form of torture.

She leaned down and kissed him, and he smiled into her lips, knowing exactly what she was up to. "That won't work," he told her. She broke away wearing a hopeful smile. "I can't, anyway. I have a mountain of work approximately equivalent to the size of Ben Nevis."

"But it's Friday!" she protested. "It can wait until Monday."

"It's _due_ for Monday," he reminded her sternly. "And, as I recall, you have a report due for Monday morning too," he added, knowing her workload, considering he had passed most of it on to her.

"That's what Sunday night is for," she said. God, she could be so infuriating – she had an answer for everything!

"So you spend Sunday night rushing through paperwork, wishing you hadn't drunk so much on Friday and hadn't stayed up so late on Saturday?" he concluded for her. She just laughed and shook her head. She perched herself on the edge of his desk and tilted her head back, so she was looking at the ceiling.

"Give me strength!" she groaned. She returned her head to look him. "It's a _social life_, Henrik. And it's high time you got yourself one."

"No," he said firmly. "I have too much else to do. But you go and have fun. Like you said, it's Friday night," he gave her a small smile, hoping he hadn't hurt her feelings by refusing to go out with her. He had his reasons, but he didn't expect her to understand them. He had never been good with people. Even as a child, his mother had tried to get him to go to all the little parties and things, and he refused to go. And when he did, he had sat in the corner without a word.

"Alright," she sighed. "At least I can tell them I gave it a shot. And I'm sure Dr. Digby will be relieved that we're not both going," she grinned. "I don't think I'll have time to see you again, so I'll see you on Monday," she smiled, and kissed him gently. His hand migrated to the back of her head as he returned her kiss, and he could feel her smile into his mouth.

She stroked his cheek lightly, and it was with reluctance that he allowed her to leave him. She smiled back at him as she left, and he was actually sorry to see her leave him. For a woman who had annoyed him half to death at times, she had definitely grown on him recently. After the things they had shared, she had dropped the hostility. She had stopped being belligerent and antagonistic towards him, swapping instead for politeness and affection. Which made him wonder why she was being like that in the first place.

His pager bleeped. Jac Naylor. Oh joy. Jac had adorned a rather unpleasant temperament recently – more unpleasant than usual – and he wasn't very keen on her new attitude, though there was no way it was without a basis. With this in mind, he began to make his way to Darwin.

He was surprised, however, when he was yanked into the consultants' office, a slim hand around his arm, taking him completely by surprise. Once the door was shut, he immediately started to berate his abductor. "Miss Naylor!" he said sternly. "What is the meaning of this?"

"I need you opinion," she admitted. "All the cowards on the ward will just say I look nice in case I eat them alive so I want someone to give me their honest opinion."

"On what?" he asked suspiciously.

"This," she gestured to her body, and he noticed now she was wearing a halter neck black dress printed with what appeared to be cherries, with bright red heels and her loosely curled hair pulled back by a black jewelled headband. Her make up was simple: eyeliner, mascara and red lipstick. How odd that she was asking _him_ for fashion advice.

"_You_ are asking _me_ for advice on clothes, shoes and make up?" he demanded, wondering why, out of all the people she knew, she was asking him. "Wouldn't you be better off asking Ms. Campbell? Or Sister Levy? They're the maternal women here, aren't they?"

"Yeah, but Serena and Chrissie are going too, and the women made a pact not to let each other see their dresses until tonight," she explained. He was made aware of the confusion that must have been gracing his face when she added, "It's a woman thing."

"What about Nurse Maconie, or Mr. Hope?" he suggested, trying his best to get out of playing this role. "Dr. Levy? Dr. Valentine?"

"Wimps, the lot of them," she scoffed. "They'll just tell me I look fine, but if you say it, I'll know it's true because you wouldn't let me go out looking like a half-wit," she explained her logic.

"It's good to see some people still have confidence in my judgement," he said, only half-joking. Jac, of course, rolled her eyes.

"Now, what do you think? I don't look like too much of an idiot, do I?" she asked, her face in a doubtful grimace.

"You look lovely," he said honestly.

"Does it fit right?"

"It fits perfectly."

"Does it clash with my hair too much?"

"It compliments your hair."

"Are you just saying that in case I bite your head off?" she asked, her eyes narrowing.

"No," he insisted. "In all honestly, Miss Naylor, you are the picture of beauty," he assured her in a rare moment of kindness. Finally accepting his sincerity, a wide smile broke across her face.

"Thank God," she sighed a breath of relief. "I wasn't sure about it. I don't normally go for dresses like that," she admitted. "Thanks. At least I know I don't look like a moron."

"I can assure you a moron is the last thing you look," he said, and he noticed his voice had taken on a rather fatherly tone. How strange. "May I ask what all of this is in aid of?"

"Party tonight," she said, taking off the ridiculously high heels. "Serena said she was going to ask you to come."

"She did," he replied. "She was not as persuasive as everyone seems to have been hoping," he quipped. Jac grinned. "In case the rest of you had not realised, parties are not my strong suit."

"Oh, don't be antisocial," she replied, rolling her eyes. "I don't do parties either, but I'm still going. Even if it _is_ just to shut Mo and Chantelle up."

"Yes, Nurse Lane is known for being excitable," he smiled dryly, seeing Chantelle's bright, enthusiastic grin in his head; he could just imagine the earache Chantelle and Mo would have had to subject Jac to in order to secure her attendance.

He noticed Jac looked down at her dress doubtfully; she was clearly still unsure about whether she suited the dress. "Don't worry about your clothes," he said. "You look beautiful," he reassured her gently.

"Thank you," she smiled. He had never seen this side to Jac, where she doubted her judgement and needed reassurance. It was reminding him that even the Ice Queen needed help with some things.

"You're very welcome," he said. What a strange place he worked in. Women who didn't discuss clothes. Consultants who asked their Director of Surgery whether their dress suited them. He turned at the door, making a split second decision as he realised he hadn't thought his original answer through. "Where is this party taking place?" he asked Jac, just in case he decided he wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

She grinned triumphantly and answered, "Hannah's Bar, in town."

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Hello, people :) God only knows how I'm still awake. It's been one hell of a day. Three hours on a bus with my college tutor, who had a broken nose and a bad mood, because the wind was so extreme it caused road blockages and sandstorms. Oh, the joys. Again, thank you for all the reviews you've left - you're all so nice to me!**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen sneaked into the bar, hoping nobody noticed him in case he changed his mind and decided that his first instinct had been right. He heard the loud, upbeat music, and immediately noticed Jac and Serena dancing happily. Jac had kept her outfit plans – how women could dance in those insane shoes, he would never understand – and Serena was wearing a floaty, satin knee-length blue dress, with glittery, pale gold shoes that were equally insane in height to Jac's. They looked like they were having fun, singing at each other along with the song. Perhaps it was better to leave them to it and not spoil their fun.

He turned on his heel to leave, but a hand was around his. He turned to see Serena. "You came," she smiled. She looked over him, taking in his clothes. "And you made an effort," she added, and he saw that playful glint in her dark eyes again. He had guessed from Jac's attire that this was to be a chance for everyone to play dress-up, so he had worn a suit slightly smarter than usual. It seemed, though, that it was not a party of reserved conversation and gentle music. It was a party of loud music, junk food and booze.

Jac was watching from the dance floor as she danced with Michael Spence. She looked slightly too wise as she met Hanssen's eyes, and he didn't like it. "Come and get a drink," Serena smiled, leading him by the hand to the bar, ordering him a large glass of red wine, and one for herself. "See?" she said, taking a sip of her wine. "Socialising isn't so bad, is it?"

He said nothing for a moment, looking around him, his eyes falling onto a rather worse for wear Oliver Valentine, trying and failing to single-handedly eat a whole pizza, mainly because most of it was ending up on the floor. "As long as socialising doesn't involve Dr. Valentine regurgitating his pepperoni pizza on my shoes," he said, and her face broke into a wide beam. He allowed her a small smile, still not comfortable with being there.

"We'll stay away from the youngsters, I think," she winked. "Though I do wish Digby would suck it up and make a move with Chantelle," she snorted when she noticed them. The F1 was being predictably nervous and awkward while the nurse was being predictably enthusiastic and friendly.

"The youngsters?" Henrik repeated.

"Valentine, Digby, Wilde, Chantelle, Mary-Claire, Malick, Jake, although I'm not sure the boy is even old enough. Something tells me he twisted Daddy's arm. Not that he needs it. He could easily pass for eighteen," she added with a smirk. "It's been a while since I could party like them," she admitted.

Hanssen smirked and retorted, "I've never been able to party like them." Serena laughed, her hand falling onto his leg. Hanssen was glad they were in a hidden corner of the bar, and that the room was dimly lit; it meant nobody could see the redness he knew was flooding into his cheeks.

"Maybe you need someone to teach you," she suggested. He didn't like the sound of particular idea, but still she firmly set her glass down and took him by the hand, dragging him to the dance floor.

"Serena," he protested quietly. "This isn't wise."

"Why?" she asked, taking both his hands, trying to get him to loosen up.

"I have two left feet," he confessed. "What _is_ that noise?" he asked, listening to the thumping music.

"Um, Rita Ora?" Serena replied, and it was clear from her disdainful expression she didn't expect him to know it. "Thank God we're not all dancing Gangnam Style," she muttered.

"What?" he asked. What was she on about now?!

"It's a dance," she replied. "Korean guy? Sunglasses? Silly dance?" she tried to see if he knew what she was on about, but he was aware his face remained blank. "Never mind." She just shook her head with a grin, looking at the floor. If he didn't know her better, he would have thought she was shy. But Serena Campbell wasn't shy. Apart from when he had walked in on her getting undressed. And when she had pulled the duvet so he couldn't see her body. And when she had looked at her plate when he explained why he was befriending her. On second thoughts, she was more timid than he had realised.

He carefully spun her under his arm, never letting go of her hands. "So," she smiled up at him. "That was a close one this morning," she said.

"Yes, it was," Henrik agreed, smirking down on her, careful not to let anyone see the softness in him just now. "I think we may have traumatised him."

"It's Digby," she snickered. "He's permanently in shock. You do realise I'm constantly making sure that boy hasn't got the wrong end of the stick?"

"I'm afraid there was only one end of that particular stick," Hanssen replied. He felt her fingers interlock with his, and the eyes of some of their colleagues giving them confused and furtive glances.

The song changed to a much slower, thankfully quieter one, and Hanssen found he didn't know what to do. This, he remembered, was why he never went out. He hesitantly let his hands drop to her upper waist, feeling her hands on his shoulders. Next to them were Jac Naylor and Jonny Maconie. Jac was smirking; when Hanssen met her eyes, he knew she knew.

"She knows," he whispered to Serena, worried that Jac would start the dreaded rumour mill turning. It was an unfortunate fact of working in that hospital that news spread like wildfire, true or other wise.

"She won't say anything," Serena replied confidently. "She didn't like it when everyone started talking about her and Jonny, so she wouldn't do that to us." She inconspicuously touched the back of his neck with her fingers, sending an odd tingling sensation through his whole body. He was sorely tempted to kiss her then and there, but remembered where he was and just how foolish an idea that would have been.

He could feel the heat of her skin through the blue satin as he held her waist. Her smile was teasing; she knew exactly what she was doing. "Having fun?" she asked.

"It's not as bad as I anticipated," he allowed. Her hand slipped slightly, her palm resting flat against his chest. He was acutely aware that his heart was beating harder and faster, and that Serena was feeling it on her hand. "There haven't been any bar brawls."

"Yet," she reminded him, sounding rather cynical. "The night is still young. They've got hours left to get even more drunk."

"You included?" he raised an eyebrow, not particularly wanting to deal with a properly drunk Serena Campbell. A few glasses of wine was one thing. Totally inebriated was another matter entirely.

"I'm being a good girl!" she protested.

"There's a first time for everything, as they say," Hanssen repressed a smile.

"Hey!" she exclaimed, hitting his chest lightly with her hand. "If you don't want to witness the horror of your employees' bad behaviour, we could always...make an escape," she suggested. She smiled as she led him off the dance floor, out into the cool night. "Only I don't have my car with me," she confessed when they were outside.

"So you _were_ planning on getting extremely intoxicated?" he openly grinned at catching her out. He had, of course, known that was her intention, whether she owned up to it or not, but he hadn't said anything because he knew she wasn't going to do that in his company.

"Until you showed up," she admitted. "Eleanor's over at Gabby's tonight. _Studying_," she sneered sceptically, and Hanssen realised the girl was probably doing anything but studying.

"Is it me being dense, or does your daughter spend more time out of your home than in it?" he asked.

"It's not just you," she sighed; he saw the sadness pass over her face but she hid it well. "_But_, it means we'd have the house to ourselves," she added, her hand sneaking up to his face as she ran her thumb over his mouth.

"And you're sure that's a path you wish to tread?" he quizzed her, unable to rid himself of the logic he knew wound her up terribly.

"Well," she said. "We'll see."

He smiled and whispered to her, "Get in my car," thankful he hadn't even drank a glass of wine as he unlocked it and got in, making sure she put her seatbelt on. The drive to her home was quiet, but not awkward like their first journey together had been. It was more settled. Hanssen put it down to the fact that she was not just a hard shell to him anymore, and he wasn't driving with a woman he didn't know how to approach.

When he parked outside her house, he realised just what he was getting into now. He proceeded with caution, getting out of the car, letting her out of her side, going through the motions until the car was locked and Serena was unlocking her front door.

When they were inside, just in the door, she closed it, and stopped dead in front of him. He felt her hands on his face, pulling his lips into his. He kissed her back gently and carefully, with more caution than he had ever done before, and he let his arms slip around her waist. Suddenly, she broke away and announced, "I am _starving_!"

Henrik looked down on her blankly before he just smiled lightly to himself at how easily distracted she was. "I don't think it's a good idea for you to cook," he smirked. "I, on the other hand, am as close to sober as anyone is tonight, and perfectly capable of cooking."

"Scrambled eggs with cheese," she murmured. He had to laugh. He didn't even know why he was laughing, really. Perhaps the slightly immature way she had spoken, or the timidity of it.

"As you wish," he replied, leading her through to her kitchen. He watched in amusement as she yanked her shoes off with a sigh of relief, and wondered why women subjected themselves to it. He turned away and grated some cheese and let the pan heat with some butter, and proceeded to beat the eggs and milk, hearing Serena's light footfalls approaching.

As he started cooking the meal, he felt arms wrap around his body and a cheek leaning against his arm. He smiled at the warmth of her body against his. He wondered why he deprived himself of this kind of affection; it was something he wanted, though he had always been too misanthropic and frightened to let anyone in far enough to feel comfortable with him.

She wasn't saying anything, and she didn't need to. He could feel from her hold on his body that all she wanted was to be near him, although it was something he still couldn't quite fathom; most people tended to run a mile when they saw him. And yet, here Serena was, with her arms around him, and, thinking back, he realised this was the most at ease in another's company he had been in many years.

* * *

**Hope this is alright!  
Please feel free to review and tell me your thoughts!  
Sarah x**


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Thanks, first, for all the reviews so far - I love you all to bits! Second, I apologise for the time at which I am uploading. Thirdly, I hope you're all still enjoying this!**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen sat down next to Serena, secretly glad she was eating something. For some reason, he became more wary of people once they had a drink. They ate together in silence. Silence was something he liked to share with her. He was glad she didn't feel the need to constantly talk, because conversing was not something he was very good at.

She opened her can of Fanta, but it sprayed. Her first reaction was to squeal and push her hands – and the can – towards him to keep her dress clean. He looked at his now patchy orange shirt in amusement. "I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed. She looked down at herself and Hanssen was even more amused by the fact that she had completely dodged the spray. Not a drop on her.

"It's fine," he replied, feeling the sugary wetness of his shirt with an inward laugh. She returned to her food, as did he, and he asked, "Why does your daughter prefer other people's homes to her own?"

"She prefers other people's mothers to her own," she replied, bitterness tainting her voice. He gave her a puzzled look, wondering what she meant.

"I'm sure that's not true," he said.

"It is," Serena huffed. "And who could really blame her? I'm hardly mother of the year, am I?"

He said nothing; he knew what she was getting at, and he knew her dedication to her work made little time for motherhood. He just ate quietly, not wanting to make her feel even worse than she obviously already did.

"That was lovely," she announced as she ate the last forkful of eggs and cheese. "Thank you," she said, standing up and taking his empty plate from him with a quick kiss. He watched her go to the kitchen, her dress waving around every time she moved. He still wasn't totally sure of her. She seemed nice enough, and genuine, but her habit of double crossing still lingered in his memory. She had definitely softened; he gave her that much. He could see yet another side to her tonight. It was a teasing side, playful and youthful.

Hesitantly, he stood up. He found himself standing behind her again, remembering with a soft smile her scolding him for looming over people. She seemed to sense his presence this time, though. She finished washing their dishes and turned around, leaning against the counter top. "You," he said, brushing her to the side, "are beautiful."

She looked surprised at this. Like she didn't know how to take it, and he saw that she didn't know if he was joking or not. "You," she replied, "are lying through your teeth."

"Excuse me?"

"I don't think anyone has called me that before. Apart from my mother, but social contract and all that."

"Not even your husband?" he replied, knowing she was divorced.

"Nope."

"Well, he must have been blind," he replied with a smile. He cupped her face in his hands, wondering to himself how a professionally confident woman like her could have such low self-esteem. But then the same could be said for him, in many ways.

He kissed her gently, and he felt her kiss back hungrily. A soft, low moan escaped her and her arms wrapped around him, pulling her close to him. "Henrik," she whispered, pulling away from him suddenly. "Henrik, I'm not sure this is a good idea." He didn't say anything, knowing she would spit it out in her own time. He just let his arms hang loosely around her waist; he was surprised when her face was leaning against his chest. "I know I could flirt for England," she said, "but I'm really not very good at the whole confidence thing."

He kissed her hair lightly, and he let her try and work her own nerve up. He couldn't do it for her, and he was not moronic enough to try; it was something she had to do herself.

Her hand reached up to his face and she kissed him, her hand slipping around to the back of his neck. He suddenly realised that, though she so often brought out his worst traits, Serena was finally cutting him loose, and he had a suspicion he was doing the same for her. He felt her push him gently backwards, towards the open door and towards the stairs.

Common sense yet again impeded Henrik when he forced her off him and looked down on her. "Are you sure?" he asked her.

"Very," she grinned, taking him by the hand up the stairs, stopping in front of her bedroom door. He kissed her slowly, feeling her hands resting on his chest. He could feel her heartbeat through their clothes – what little clothes Serena was wearing. She opened the door and pulled him in, unbuttoning his sodden, recently stained, shirt, her nimble fingers moved lightly against his body.

He felt around for the zip on her dress, trying to figure out if it was on the back or on the side; it was well hidden. He felt his hand guided by hers, their lips never severing contact, to the side of her chest, where he found a tiny piece of metal.

He was momentarily startled when her fingers found the scar on his abdomen; he was relieved when she said nothing of it. He felt her trying to wriggle free of her dress in his arms. She lost her balance, knocking him flat onto the bed, her body unceremoniously sprawled across his. She broke their kiss to laugh, "Sorry!"

"It's perfectly alright," he grinned, pulling her back down to him.

* * *

When Hanssen woke the next morning he was slightly disconcerted by his surroundings; this most definitely was not his bedroom. He turned over to find a sleeping Serena Campbell, and smiled at the memory of how he ended up here. It amazed him to find that he did not regret it. But he wasn't going to let her know that. There was still a niggling doubt in his mind that the woman sleeping next to him was nothing more than an exceptional actress and felt nothing for him, and was merely trying to get at him.

That doubt, however, shrank with every time he rediscovered it. He reminded himself that she would not have compromised her own security to hurt him. He had seen her at her most vulnerable. She would never have allowed him to see that part of her had she not held some feeling of affection for him. Actually, she would never have exposed herself had she not wanted to let him in.

She stirred, and when she opened her eyes, it was with a brief look of mild shock. "Good morning," she said.

"Good morning," he replied, smirking to himself. There was no way she was acting. He was sure of it. Her face betrayed emotion; confusion, spirit, doubt...she wasn't putting it on for show.

They just lay there for a few minutes in silence. Henrik wondered where they would take whatever they had started. They couldn't very well let anyone know, could they? Though, from the knowing look on the woman's face last night, Hanssen was convinced Jac had worked it out.

"Henrik," Serena said; he heard the caution in her voice. She was about to ask something she wasn't sure she had a right to ask. "On your abdomen. The scar. How did you get that one?"

He sighed. He had tried to stop anyone from knowing about this. It involved too much politics from the past, and it was a time he didn't want to revisit. "Richie Mooney's son," he said quietly. "Do you remember I issued a public apology?"

"Yeah," she replied. "Watched it with Ric in the Keller staffroom."

"Earlier that day," he began, "the boy took me hostage in his works van. He was throwing quite the temper tantrum, though it was to be expected, of course. When he finally saw fit to let me go, I asked him to give me his nail gun. He would not give it willingly so I attempted to take it by force. It all happened in a flash, but the bottom line was the he shot a nail into me."

"And you didn't think to tell anyone?" Serena raised an eyebrow at him, clearly unimpressed by the way he had handled that situation. "You can can be such a bloody idiot sometimes," she groaned. "Why didn't you get someone to help you stitch it up? Doing it yourself can't have been fun."

"Panic was the last thing I wanted to cause," he told her honestly.

"Why didn't you call me?" she demanded. "I wouldn't have told anyone. You know that."

"I do now," he smiled lightly at her. "But you have to admit, we weren't exactly the best of friends at that point, were we?"

"You kicked me down to AAU," she accused.

"Yes, I did."

"Why?"

"First, I thought you needed to be taught a lesson," he retorted, and she didn't bother denying the truth in that statement. She knew as well as he did that she crossed the line. "Second, I was sick to the back teeth of you and Michael Spence being at each other's throats, so I gave you no choice but to get along. And thirdly, I thought the both of you could use each other's company. I don't know if you had noticed, but Michael is a very lonely man."

"Of course I noticed," she returned. "Christmas was hell for him. Annalese decided he wasn't getting to see his kids."

"That was nice of her," Henrik sarcastically sneered. He knew that Michael, unlike himself, desperately wanted his children around and, although the man irritated him, he thought what Annalese did was unfair.

"I have a feeling that woman would drive me mad," Serena admitted with a smile.

"Serena, the whole world drives you mad," he reminded her. She laughed and leaned in to kiss him. So she didn't regret their night together either then. That was reassuring to know. Her arm had slipped around his body, her hand in his hair.

He broke away from her, asking for what felt the hundredth time, "Is it wise to embark on...whatever this is going to be?"  
"I don't know," she confessed. "What matters is whether _we_ are happy, not if everyone else is," she informed him, her voice taking on a layer of strictness he hadn't expected.

He didn't say anything to her. It was all the answer she would have needed when he put her lips to hers, pulling her close. "What happened to the Henrik Hanssen who hates to be touched?" she teased.

He brushed her hair away from her face, meeting her dark eyes for a moment, knowing he was taking the joking remark too seriously. He did see the point; he had rarely allowed anyone to touch him if it could be avoided, and only really touched others in a professional light. Yet he had allowed Serena to hug him, kiss him, even sleep with him. Not only had he allowed it, but he had willingly reciprocated it, going against everything he had taught himself.

He kissed her and said, "You happened." She smiled and kissed him passionately. He didn't quite understand what had brought about that sudden display of desire but returned it nonetheless, allowing her to take control of him. She didn't seem to realise that by taking control, she was also giving him freedom, because he felt confident enough to seize it. She was giving him the ability to take the liberation he had never saw himself finding again, until the night he had allowed Serena Campbell into his home and let her find a way into his heart.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Hello again people! :) sorry this took a while to update - I had a accident with my laptop (stood on it) and then spent a day debating on whether to actually write this.**

**Thanks for all the reviews!  
**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen sat at his desk on Monday morning, unable to think about anything other than the weekend. It was not often he had weekend worthy of his attention come Monday morning, but his weekend with Serena had been the best he had had in a long time.

There was only one thing that troubled him now. Serena had asked about his scar; he had given her the truth. She hadn't done anything but berate him for not telling anyone. But she had understood. He, however, had noticed her scars. Thin, old, fairly small, spread across her abdomen and raised slightly against his hand, they were near enough invisible until he was close enough to see them. They went unnoticed until the third time hey had fallen into bed together, and after that he was reluctant to approach her about it because he didn't know how.

He just didn't know if it was his right to ask her about them. She was more forward than he was. If she wanted to know something she generally just asked. He, on the other hand, was too scared of the answer to ask. They definitely were not surgical scars; they had healed poorly, and were not in the right places.

Many ideas had run through his mind about it, and he came up with only two reasons that she would not explain them off her own back. The first was that they were so insignificant that she didn't see the point in telling him about it. The second was that they were _so_ significant to her that she could not trust him with the knowledge of how she acquired those marks.

There was a knock at the door, causing him to jump slightly. "Come in!" he called. To his surprise, Jac Naylor carefully stepped in. "Ah, Miss Naylor," he greeted her. "What can I help you with?"

"You and Serena," she said bluntly. So she had noticed. "Something's going on, isn't it?"

"What makes you think that?" he demanded, and she just smirked for a moment before she answered him. He had been right when the notion had crossed his mind on Friday night. She knew.

"She got you out to a party," Jac reminded him. "And the way you were looking at her, it was obvious you wanted to rip that dress right off her and leave it on the bedroom floor."

Taken aback at her honesty, he raised an eyebrow at her, to which she just grinned. "I thought women had these conversations with each other, and not with the man," he shot at her.

"Nah. Serena and I aren't the girly-chat type," she quipped, leaning back into her chair. "So. What happened after you two so expertly slipped out the party?" Refusing to meet her eyes, he shifted uncomfortably in his chair. A triumphant look spread across Jac's face - "You slept together, didn't you?!"

What a bizarre conversation to have with Jac Naylor, he realised. Of everyone, he would never have guessed Jac to be the one to approach him about it. But he knew she wouldn't judge him for sleeping with a colleague. She and Jonny Maconie had been sleeping together, on and off, for months, after all. And then there had been Joseph Byrne, of course.

"You and Serena," she laughed. "I didn't see that one coming. Maybe why that's why she sent me to Sweden. Maybe she just wanted you back."

"Somehow that is doubtful," Henrik retorted. "She was extremely put out when I came back here."

"Well. She's not now, is she? I thought she seemed a bit too happy this morning," Jac added. She gave him a searching look and he started to inwardly panic as he realised she could see he was vexed by something. "What's bothering you? Is it to do with Serena?"

He paused, deciding whether to share the full extent of his worries. He didn't want her to know that Serena had old unexplained injuries but he did feel like he needed advice from somewhere, and Jac was the only place he was going to find it. "No. No, it isn't her," he finally lied. "If you saw scars, old abdominal scars, that were nothing to do with a surgical procedure, would you question it?"

"What are you thinking? Accident? Abuse? Self-harm?" she asked, and he was thankful that she had taken on her professional tone once more.

"I haven't made any assumptions yet," he allowed.

"Well, you have to ask these questions, as a doctor," she said. "But then you know that. Which makes me think this is nothing to do with any patient. In which case," she continued. "A good friend would ask. Even if they didn't get an answer, a good friend would ask."

Hanssen felt dread build up inside him; he had been hoping Jac would tell him to leave the issue alone. He could no longer plead social ignorance when Jac had explained he would remiss not to question Serena on her scars. "Thank you for the advice," he replied, his voice stiffer than he thought it was going to be.

He saw Jac's critical stare turn to frustration he was actually able to understand. Three nights ago, she had seen him start to loosen up and be open. Today, he was doing all he could to keep her from seeing the truth of his question. She didn't seem to realise that he was just protecting Serena in only telling half-truths; he didn't have a clue what those scars were. They might have been something totally innocent, after all.

She finally gave in and went to the door, but she turned as her hand pulled the handle. "A good friend asks the question, Mr. Hanssen, but the best kind of man is the one who accepts the answer and loves her anyway." With that she left him with his thoughts and the realisation that Jac could see right through him when it came to personal matters. When it came to Serena.

He sat with his head in his hands, wondering what the hell he was meant to do. These scars, he reminded himself, were obviously very, very old. The probability was that they were irrelevant to her now. They were probably a result of an accident, maybe even the car accident that claimed her father's life.

But he had to know. It wasn't just curiosity; it was concern, and a need to know what had happened to her.

He got up and wandered down to Keller, his pace slower than usual while he tried to talk himself out of asking her. He found his conscience taking him to her office, knocking on the door lightly. "Yes!" he heard her call. He opened the door just enough for him to get in, and saw her smile. "Mr. Hanssen. Good weekend?" she asked; she got to her feet with that flirtatious sparkle in her eyes.

He suppressed a smile and let her put her arms around his neck as he put his around her body. "Very good, Ms. Campbell. I spent it with an exceptionally beautiful woman," he played along. "Yours?"

"The best I've had in a long time. I spent it with an exceptionally handsome man," she grinned. She kissed him lightly with a smile, pulling him in slightly. She almost distracted him as he returned the kiss. Almost.

He pulled away from her, his arms still around her waist, placing a gentle kiss on her head. How was he supposed to ask her? She had just come out with it; he didn't have that forwardness in him. It was one simple question: _how did the scarring on your abdomen come about?_ The problem was that he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer.

She leaned up and kissed him, seemingly oblivious to his internal debate. As he kissed her back he tried to think of a way to go about it so he wouldn't feel like he was prying, or like he was being impolite.

He forced her lips from his, his hands gentle on her face, and looked into her eyes. If she was not so unreadable, he may have been able to work it out for himself without the awkwardness of actually asking her. The fact remained, however, that, though she was sociable and happy, she was still guarded and cagey.

His hands stayed on her face as he leaned back slightly to get a better look at her expression. She had cottoned on to him now, realising that there was something bothering him.

"You trust me, don't you?" he asked her, wanting to make sure that she believed in him before he asked her any questions.

"Of course," she smiled.

"Then you would be willing to tell me why your abdomen is covered in scars," he said. He inwardly cursed at himself. He had sounded too harsh, and Serena's expression confirmed it. She took her arms from around his neck and pushed his hands off her face, looking ever so slightly haunted.

"Close the door on your way out," she said, her voice dead and flat. She went back to her desk and returned to her work, making it abundantly obvious that she wasn't divulging any more of her secrets to him. Hanssen did the only thing there was left to do and walked away, closing the door as she had asked him to.

He walked slowly – even slower that the first journey – until he reached the stairs. He did not want to leave it alone; it wasn't in his nature. Actually, it was not only because his nature would not allow him to drop it. It was more that his morality and affection for her would not allow it.

"No," he whispered to himself. "No."

He turned on his heel and went back to her office, opening the door without even knocking and walking in towards the empty chair. She didn't look up when she warned, "If you sit in that chair, Henrik, I will make sure it's the last thing you do."

He ignored her, though still obeying her wishes – he carefully sat down on the floor and brought his knees up. "You are joking," she drawled. She still had not removed her attention from what she was doing, but he could see she knew what he had done. And that she wasn't happy about it.

"I haven't sat in the chair," he reminded her, even though he had known what she meant when she said it. She finally looked up from her paperwork to see him. He didn't care if it annoyed her. He wanted to know. He wanted to know _her_. There was a story behind every scar. Some amusing, some moronic and some excruciatingly painful. But they all had a story behind them.

He had managed to share the story. She clearly did not want to; he saw the fear in her eyes. It was almost like she was frightened of what he would think of that story. "You _can_ tell me," he reminded her.

She stayed silent, causing him to run his hand down his face in frustration.

"I can sit here all day, Serena."

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to drop me a review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: This is quite sad, even for me, so I hope it doesn't upset anyone. And thanks to everyone who has read and reviewed!**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen looked at his watch. He had been sitting there an hour. She had said nothing to him in that time. Not a single word. And it worried him. Forty minutes ago, she had opened her laptop and was borderline obsessively typing away.

"Are you going to speak?" he finally sighed, his head in his hands as he grew more and more tired of her attitude. She was silent; she wouldn't even look at him. "I'll take that as a resounding _no_," he sighed.

He realised now that he had gone about it wrong. After internally working it out in his mind, he had still managed to sound incredibly harsh and unfeeling. He almost wished she had slapped him. He felt he would have deserved it; he had known there was a chance that it was a sensitive subject, and still his brain had not processed the question before he said it. And so here he sat on her office floor, ignored by Serena and feeling like an idiot.

"I know that sounded coarse," he admitted into the silence. "I didn't think." Still nothing. This was driving him mad and he knew she was doing it deliberately in the hope he would go away and leave her alone.

It was obvious to Henrik that she didn't have the energy to fight him on this. She had energy – plenty of it – but not enough to fight him. And that just left ignorance as her only weapon. The silent treatment. She was returning the cruelty, and he couldn't really blame her. He hadn't gone about asking her in a very sensitive manner and now it was blatantly obvious that he had wounded her.

He watched her intently; she was carefully avoiding looking at him. Her fingers were typing rapidly, like she was using the clacking of the keys to distract her from his presence on her floor.

There was a knock on the door, and Michael Spence stepped in, his gaze falling onto Hanssen. "Um, you do know Mr. Hanssen is sitting on you floor, don't ya, Rena?" he asked happily.

"Don't ask, Michael," Serena sighed. "Just don't bother. And stop calling me that!" she ordered him. Henrik knew Michael wasn't going to stop calling her that, and he knew Serena didn't really care. She was just trying to maintain her appearances.

"OK, OK!" Michael exclaimed. "Jeez. Somebody needs to go on the happy pill."

"Funny," Serena snapped, not looking away from her screen. "What did you want?" she demanded. He handed her a form, presumably for her to sign off on surgery. She scanned it and signed it, but Michael didn't leave.

"Is everything alright?" he asked them cautiously. Hanssen didn't speak for fear of making matters worse, and Serena didn't either. "Serena?" he persisted. "You could cut the atmosphere with a knife."

Henrik watched as she thought about how to get rid of the American. She finally said, "I'm a big girl, Michael. I can handle the Grim Reaper and all his _many_ failings," she drawled. "Sensitivity being one of them."

"What?" Michael asked, his face and voice full of pure confusion.

"I'm sorry! Alright? I am _sorry_!" Hanssen exclaimed, finally at his wit's end with her obvious torment and merciless ignorance.

"Hold up," Michael said, raising his hands. "What have you got to apologise for?"

"Get out, Michael!" Hanssen and Serena shouted together, both annoyed with his attempts at intervention. Michael was taken aback at their aggressiveness as they both grew more and more frustrated with him. He did leave but not before he gave them both a worried glance; Hanssen knew Serena's time on AAU had made them fairly close. Close by Serena's standards, at least. He knew Michael was quietly protective of Serena now, hence the reason he was the only person in the hospital who got off with using her pet name.

"Serena, will you please just say _something_ to me?"

She didn't reply. She was torturing him now and there was no doubt in his mind that she was doing it on purpose. She had to realise that he hated it. She was acting as if he wasn't there, just a part of the wall he was leaning against.

She closed her laptop and he realised she was about to leave; he got to his feet and beat her to the door, blocking her path so she would have no choice but to talk. "Move," she snarled up at him. He stared down on her and watched the anger bubble to the surface. "Bloody _hell_!" she growled. He felt a blow to his chest as she hit him. She did it again in an effort to force him away from the door. Again and again, she battered his chest until he caught her wrists and stopped her.

He met her eyes and saw there was something seriously wrong. There was something ghostly about her stare.

Adding to this ghostliness was the fact that her face had drained white.

"Henrik, get out of my way before I seriously hurt you," she warned. She meant it. He could tell from the way her face was slightly contorted in anguish and wrath; she really had been hurt by what he had said. Of course, that meant that, not only had he said it the worst way he possibly could have done, but the answer was not something she liked to share.

"No," he replied sternly. He wasn't going to be beaten by her. Especially when her beating him wasn't in the good interests of either of them. He had thought the car accident had been the one real trauma in her life. What if he had been wrong? What if it was just the tip of the iceberg?

He had not released her hands. She would only have started hitting him again, or tried to move him some other way. "Henrik, _please_," she said. Her eyes were shining again, but not with playfulness and wickedness. It was a haunted radiance shining in her eyes. There was something she had tried to leave behind her, and he had just dragged it up in the clumsiest possible fashion.

It was that ghostly look that made him pull her into a tight cuddle. He hated to see her pained, and knowing he had brought up the cause just made things infinitely worse. She struggled against him but he just held her tighter in the knowledge that, whether or not she cared to admit it, he had caused her pain and he was deeply sorry for it.

"I'm sorry, Serena," he told her quietly. "I didn't mean to upset you."

She stopped struggling and let her arms slip around him. She had accepted his apology at last. He put a hand on the back of her head and held it to his chest. "Please, just tell me," he said, sharply aware of the pleading note in his voice. She shook her head and he sighed. He already had his suspicions about it. He didn't want to believe it, but he was starting to think the injuries might have been deliberate. It was the only reason he could find for her being so defensive over it.

He put her at arms' length and attempted to read her guarded face, to no avail. Instead of trying to talk it out of her, he decided to try something else. If it worked, very good. If it didn't, though, it was probably going to earn him a fairly hard smack.

His hands dropped carefully from her shoulders, down her arms to her hands. Her shaking hands. Since when did Serena Campbell tremble? He gave her a look of warning which she seemed to accept and took the hem of her top in his fingers, slowly lifting it to reveal her pale stomach. The thin white scars were far more visible under the bright light of the office than in her dimly lit bedroom. There were more of them than he had originally thought.

She looked up at him, and he met her gaze only briefly. "Henrik," she whispered with a trace of a warning in her tone. He traced his fingers over her skin, feeling the raised lines. She turned her head away from him and stared at the wall. She couldn't even look at him. They were sprawled across her skin right up to her ribcage, just below her bra.

He saw her face – only the side of it – and saw her eyes glistening with unshed tears.

"There are so many," he whispered. The tears spilled over and she angrily wiped them away. He couldn't comprehend how much pain they must have caused her at the time. "How old are they?" he asked her. She bit her lip and tried to stem the flood of tears, still refusing to look at him. "Serena?"

She breathed deeply for a moment; he felt her diaphragm move under his hand. "Thirty years, give or take," she answered him, though her voice came out in little more than a whimper.

She had been a teenager when this happened. The unpleasant feeling he had before now was growing. "Just tell me the truth," he said. He was dreading the answer. He finally asked the one question he did not want to ask her. "Serena, did you do this to yourself?"

She would not look at him, and he realised that she was ashamed. He didn't need her to speak to confirm it; her face told him it was what happened. She started to properly cry, her breath catching in her throat as she kept almost choking; her face had tears streaming down it and he now saw that, like the car accident, she had never spoken of this.

It made him wonder how she had managed to hide it for thirty years. Was she just exceptionally good at hiding it? Or had others seen it and not cared enough to ask?

He couldn't understand it. She had slept with him knowing he would see this. Was it just that nobody had asked before and she assumed he wouldn't bother either? But he wasn't her ex-husband and he actually did care. He cared about her more than he ever thought was possible and to see her like this broke his heart.

He put her top down and let his hands rest on her upper arms. She still didn't turn to look at him. It was almost like she was scared to see what he was thinking. What he thought of _her_.

"Oh, Serena," he sighed. He could see in her face that she expected him to walk away from her now that he knew the things she had done to herself, but he didn't want to walk away. He wanted to know why. He wanted to know what drove her to do it.

Bearing this in mind, he took a step towards her and put his arms protectively around her body. She flinched slightly at his touch, obviously surprised at his reaction. And then she cried. And cried. And cried. And he held her with all his strength. This was the secret she had been keeping all this time. The crash had only partially screwed her up; her teenage years had done a bigger job on her.

He pressed his face into her hair. "Ssh," he whispered to her softly. "It's alright."

What else could he do?

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: This is the aftermath of the last chapter, an it's still a bit sad. Also, Chantelle features in this chapter. I love Chantelle, and I love writing her. She's so cheerful and innocent, but she does see more than she lets on, I think :) Thanks for all the reviews too.**

**Sarah x**

* * *

They were sitting in identical positions – backs against the door, knees up, arms leaning on their knees, both completely silent. Hanssen didn't know what to do; for a woman who spent half her life slyly screwing people over, she was unbelievably screwed up herself. He had had no idea that she had a trail of destruction behind her. A dead father by the time she was nine years old, and now it seemed she had spent a good few years harming herself.

The pain she must have been in to do that herself. The image of a young Serena taking a blade to her skin haunted him.

He looked around at her; she was just staring at her hands. She looked exhausted. He stood up and held his hand down to her. She looked up at him and took it, letting him pull her to her feet. She went to open the door but he caught her wrist and turned her back around to face him.

He kissed her very lightly and felt her breath hitch; she hadn't expected him to still want her. That much was obvious.

His hand touched her face gently, kissing her until she kissed back. Eventually she started to come out of her state of shock and he felt her hand flat on his chest and her other arm around his waist. She wasn't as tough as she pretended. What he had seen in her today was the hidden fragility she had tried to forget.

"Why?" she asked him when she broke the kiss. "Why haven't you walked away?"

"Because it doesn't change anything," he explained to her. She looked confused. Was she expecting him to hate her for it? For him to be disgusted by it? For him not to understand?

He didn't understand. He admitted that. All he understood was that she had been in a great deal of pain and it caused her to go down the route of self-harm. It didn't change who she was. She was still Serena and she was always going to be. And it just so happened that Serena was the woman who had, for whatever reason, made him show real affection for the first time in years. Not the twisted, backward version everyone else saw and never understood, but the direct warmheartedness of kisses and cuddles and sleeping together.

"Why did you do it?" he asked her gently.

"I went through a phase of hating myself, and for a while every day was a struggle and every smile was forced. Well, my mother called it a 'phase' but then she never got to see the consequences, did she?"

"Depression?"

"Hmm," she nodded. "I'm sure my mum thought it was me just being a stroppy, moody teenage brat. I made her life a living hell for a while."

"While you really did live in hell," he added. He stroked her hair lightly, hoping he wasn't pushing his luck. "Serena, what you did thirty years ago doesn't change the way I see you. The fact you are covered in scars doesn't make you any less beautiful. It doesn't make you weak. They are a part of your story," he explained his thinking to her. "They are a part of _you_."

He didn't add that she was what he wanted now; she was dangerously close to tears again and he didn't want to upset her any more than he had already today.

Her thumb traced his mouth lightly and he smiled; she had accepted that he wasn't going to hate her for anything she did as a teenager. If he had it in him to hate her, she had given him plenty of reasons to and he would have despised her months ago. He couldn't really hate her. There was a light in her that he rarely saw in anyone. The fire that was so destructive was also the thing that burned bright in her. It was the thing that most attracted him to her.

Her arms were suddenly around his waist again and she was leaning into him. It felt so strange to have her looking for comfort, especially in him. She normally pushed everyone away and now he knew why.

He hadn't even noticed his hand move to the back of her head or his fingers in her hair; it was a subconscious reaction to her embrace. Was he now so involved with her that his mind and body worked effortlessly together to try and soothe and protect her?

The door opened silently – so much that Serena didn't even notice – and Chantelle Lane stopped dead in the doorway, an endearing look of shock on her face. Hanssen gave her a small smile and mouthed, "I'll explain later." She smiled and nodded, silently shutting the door again.

"You're too skinny," Serena accused quietly.

"Just the way I'm built, I'm afraid," he smiled, and she squeezed him tight for a moment. "Inconveniently tall and unfortunately thin."

"Since when was being tall inconvenient?"

"Since you were a good nine or ten inches shorter than me," he retorted. "Ten inches is a lot when you are trying to kiss a woman, you know," he teased. He felt her smile into his chest.

"You have to go back to work," she reminded him. She was right; there were things that needed done. "So do I, for that matter."

"Alright," he sighed. "I'll come and see you before I leave for the day," he promised her as she took her arms from around his body.

"I don't need a minder."

"I know you don't," he smiled. "I just want to know you're OK." She seemed not to believe him; was it really so difficult for her to believe he cared about her? He pressed a kiss into her hair and left her with the intention of finding Chantelle before word got round that Henrik Hanssen had been holding the infallible Serena Campbell in his arms.

"Nurse Lane," Hanssen said when he found her at the nurses' station. "Can I have a private word please? Perhaps over a coffee?" he offered.

"Sure. I'm due a break anyway," she smiled brightly.

Once they were sat at a table, and Chantelle was happily munching on a cinnamon roll, Hanssen explained himself. "About what you walked in on-"

"Oh, it's fine," she waved his concern away. "I won't tell anyone." Hanssen smiled to himself; so Digby hadn't said anything about witnessing the pair of them just about ready to rip each other's clothes off in the office. On reflection, it was just as well the boy had walked in on them. There may have been an extremely upsetting conversation had that happened and her bare skin had been under the unflattering glare of the white lights.

"I feel I should probably explain myself. After all, Ms. Campbell isn't the type to simply fall into one's arms," he admitted.

"Everyone needs a cuddle sometimes," she replied. "Even Ms. Campbell. Actually, especially her." Hanssen gave her a look, curious as to what she meant. "Well, she's not exactly happy, is she?"

Hanssen was surprised. Serena had always seemed, to him, to be at ease, contented, happy, even. But to Chantelle she wasn't. Chantelle had seen her façade of sparkling, fearsome spirit for what it was – a façade. It wasn't always false, but Hanssen realised now that there were times when Serena was not what she appeared.

"What makes you think that?"

"She has this thing where she smiles when she doesn't want people to see what she's really thinking, but I can usually see right through that," Chantelle explained. "She's lonely."

"Is she really?" Hanssen asked into his cup.

"Not anymore," she reasoned as she tore a piece of cinnamon roll off and put it in her mouth. "I worked that one out the second she started being nice."

Hanssen started to worry that Chantelle had worked it out for herself; she had a reputation for being a bit dim but Hanssen knew she was capable of being very perceptive when she put her mind to it. "So what is your theory regarding that?"

"You," she said simply. "You're the change. I watched you leave with her last week. I saw you let her out of your car the next morning. And then you slipped out of the party on Friday," she recounted. "You managed to get her out of the bathrooms the morning she took that little funny turn."

Hanssen couldn't help but smile. Why did everyone write Chantelle off as air-headed? Even Serena, regardless of the incident with Adrienne, mothered her slightly, like she was incapable of thinking for herself. But Chantelle had taken all the evidence and found the right answer where nobody else but Jac and Malick had noticed the slight shift in their personalities.

"I'm blonde, Mr. Hanssen," she said. "I'm not stupid."

"I never did understand that," Henrik replied. "What has the colour of one's hair got to do with their intelligence?"

Chantelle just beamed and continued on her coffee and pastry. "I think it's a good thing. You and Ms. Campbell, I mean," she elaborated. "I know she's hardly Mother Theresa, but she's nice really. She just tries to protect herself. She's damaged," Chantelle shrugged, like it was obvious. But it wasn't obvious. Not to Hanssen and not to anyone else.

"Can I ask a favour?"

"Of course."

"Do you think you could keep an eye on Ms. Campbell today, just to make sure she is alright?" Hanssen asked. He wasn't sure why, but he wanted someone to make sure Serena was alright today; the state she had been in was the complete opposite of what he was used to, which frightened him a little. He didn't know what it was he was feeling for Serena right now, but at the forefront of it was a concern for her.

"Sure," Chantelle smiled. "Is there something wrong?" she added.

Hanssen hesitated. He had no intention of telling Chantelle of what had caused it – that was Serena's business – but he knew she would need some kind of reason why the Director of Surgery was asking a nurse to keep a watch on the Clinical Executive Director. "She had a bit of an upset earlier," he allowed.

"OK," Chantelle agreed brightly.

"Thank you," he said sincerely. He looked at his watch. The three hours he had spent dealing with Serena, Michael and Chantelle had severely set him back work-wise, but he was glad he had taken that time to get to the bottom of things. Hopefully this would be the final hornets' nest he kicked when it came to Serena.

"Back to work, Mr. Hanssen?" Chantelle suggested, rising to her feet. He too stood up, and Chantelle patted his back happily. "If anything happens, I'll get you. I think she'll be fine though."

"And how can you be sure of that?" he remarked as they approached the lift.

"I can't," she admitted. They stepped in the lift together, Chantelle pressing the button for Keller and then the button for the fifth floor. "I just know she's found a really good friend, and everyone feels better when they've got a real friend, don't they?"

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me your thoughts!  
Sarah x**


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: Again, totally unacceptable time to be updating - sorry!**

**What happens to Hanssen in the second part of this chapter actually happened to me at the weekend. Bloody hell. Scariest. Thing. Ever. Road testing my mum's car to see what was going wrong with it was not a good idea; I don't even have a license (naughty, I know!) but it was a private road so it wasn't so bad. But I nearly ended up the the berry field and it was nothing to do with my crappy driving!**

**Yet again, thanks for all the lovely reviews :)**

**Sarah x**

* * *

When Hanssen next saw Serena, it was as as she got into her car to go home. He had tried her office to find her gone. He couldn't help but panic slightly by that point; after seeing the weakest parts of her, he was finding himself rather protective of her. But it was with relief that he saw her making crossing an otherwise deserted car park from a second floor window.

He walked over as she unlocked it. She turned to him with a smile. "I'm fine, Henrik," she assured him before he could even ask the question. "Believe me. I am _fine_," she smiled. He didn't say anything as her hands came to sit on either side of his waist. "Although your concern is very sweet."

She was wearing a wide smile but he wasn't sure if he liked it or not; he didn't know if it was real and she had overcome today's events or if she was trying to appease him by pretending she was as she was.

"That is not a word used to describe me," he asserted sternly. She just grinned wider and pulled him down into a strange lingering kiss – when they broke apart, he still felt her lips on his.

"It is now," she replied. "You know, we could go for a drink. Christ knows I could use one. Or we could go back to mine and open a bottle of wine. Eleanor won't mind. She's been mocking my lack of a sex life since she was fourteen."

"Somehow I don't think that's wise," he reminded her. He didn't want her to drink after all that in case it made her upset again.

"No, probably not," she admitted. "There's always the on-call rooms," she said, a wicked glint in her dark eyes. Hanssen unsuccessfully attempted to disguise his horror at that idea; the chances of them getting caught in an on-call room in this hospital were massive. She kept silent a moment as she studied his expression before she burst out laughing. "Your face!" she giggled.

He couldn't help smiling; maybe she was alright like she claimed to be. Perhaps the scars were not who she was, but a part of how she used to survive. "I'll see you tomorrow," she finally stopped laughing. "Eleanor will be wanting fed and I banned from the kitchen last week," she explained.

"Why?"

"She set the pan on fire and then put water on it," Serena said with a look of disdain. "Could've burned the bloody kitchen down. I love her to bits but she can be ever so dense sometimes," she admitted.

"A bit like her mother," Hanssen answered her back. Serena gave him an odd look before she got in the car; what had he said wrong this time? He was only joking when he said Serena could be dense, and she knew that. Whatever had made her look at him like that, though, she quickly brushed off.

"'Night," she smiled.

"Goodnight," he replied. She closed the door and drove off with a smile; he was sure it was as much for her daughter's benefit as it was for Serena's.

He decided it was probably time to call it a night now; it had been a stressful day full of the strains of watching Serena Campbell's confident, cocky exterior crack right down the middle and knowing it was his doing. He almost regretted bringing it up but he couldn't quite bring himself to. It meant he could go to sleep knowing her one story better than he had waking up this morning.

It was funny – six months ago, just before he walked out on the hospital, she had well and truly driven him to distraction with her antics. Now, however, she drove him to distraction for completely different reasons.

He couldn't push from his mind the idea that she was simply too good an actress. She had obviously spent many years perfecting the art if she went through all of that and her own mother never realised.

By the time he reached his office, he was exhausted. How could a day that started so happily end with him in a hurricane of mixed emotions? In a way, it was his own fault. He had asked the question – albeit badly – and stuck around to hear the answer. Why had he put himself through that?

That was the question he continued to ponder as he started the ignition. Sighing, he set off, leaving the car park. He went over the speed bump carefully, startled when there was a clunking sound from the passenger side. He thought nothing of it and proceeded onto the main road.

What was the point of all this? What was the point of letting her bury herself under his skin, whether she was aware of it or not? She was only making him confused, his concentration a fraction of what it normally was.

And then he realised. It wasn't what she was doing. It was how he was reacting to her. She wasn't doing anything to him; the concentration issues and confusion and all the muddled emotions he felt was part of the way he was reacting to her. For the first time, he was reacting to Serena with something other than caution and a wish to hang her by the ankles from the roof.

All of a sudden, the car pulled itself into the middle of the road, right into the path of oncoming traffic. "Bloody hell!" Henrik shouted, grappling to get the car back onto the right side of the road. His heart was in his mouth. That wasn't his driving that caused that; he was sure of it.

He drove far slower now, ignoring the protests of drivers from behind. He wasn't going to risk his life to get them home faster.

Everything seemed to be alright but he was reluctant to increase his speed by much. His heart was pounding so hard he could have sworn it was going to break a rib. He racked his brains trying to find a reason for what happened. Something to do with the steering, most definitely.

He didn't trust the car; he tried to think of a way out of driving it all that way to get home but there were no shortcuts he could think of. It wasn't like him to do that but that had honestly been a terrifying experience.

He approached the T-junction witch care, gradually slowing down long before he normally would have done. He turned off and cautiously continued his journey, conscious that he was now in an increasingly built-up residential area.

His heart nearly stopped again when the car pulled in towards the pavement. It was a struggle to keep the steering straight and Hanssen found he was frightened of his own car. That the next time he wouldn't be able to control it and it would end up hurting him or someone else. He wouldn't be able to get home in it without losing his nerve.

An idea crossed his mind as he reduced his speed once more. Serena's house was not far from here. Not as far as his was and the less time he spent driving like this, the better.

Without considering it further, he drove to her house and parked outside, trying to regain his composure. He didn't want Serena to see he was unnerved. That was a plan he knew was going to fail when he realised his heart was still pounding and his hands were actually shaking.

He got out the car and locked it, carefully stepping up to the front door. He knocked and seconds later was greeted by a teenage girl. "Hello?" she asked.

"Is your mother home yet?" he asked.

"No need to check up on me, Henrik!" he heard a shout from through the house somewhere. The girl he assumed to be Eleanor rolled her eyes and let him in. She guided him to the kitchen where Serena, for once, seemed to have the cooking situation under control.

"I'm not," he admitted. "I couldn't drive my car as far as my house so I stopped here," he explained his logic.

"What?" Serena asked, turning to lean against the countertop.

"The steering pulled. Twice," he added. "Well, I say it pulled, but it felt more like it was actually powering over to the side. The first time straight into the oncoming traffic on the main road."

"You're bloody lucky you weren't killed!" she exclaimed the obvious. Eleanor rolled her eyes once more at her mother's reaction, much to Henrik's internal amusement. He could already see there were similarities in the mother and daughter's personalities. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," he reassured her. "I refuse to drive that car, though. Next time I may not be so fortunate."

"You're welcome to stay here," Serena immediately offered.

"We don't have a spare room, Mum," Eleanor reminded. Serena met Henrik's eyes briefly. It was obvious she hadn't told her daughter what was going on between them. Probably wise considering neither one could really define it at the moment.

"We're mature adults," Serena finally said. "I'm sure we're more than capable of sharing a bed, aren't we, Henrik?"

"Oh, so it's _Henrik _now," Eleanor feigned surprise. "Only, what, a month ago it was the _Dark Lord_. And _Count Dracula_. And-"

"Alright, Eleanor, that's quite enough!" Serena cut across her daughter, shooting Hanssen an apologetic look. "You should have something to eat," she reminded him that neither of them had really eaten all day.

He smiled and took his coat off, hanging it up on the only free hook. How on Earth could two women possess so many coats?

As they sat down to dinner, Henrik listened to Serena chatting to Eleanor about her day, talking about everything from coursework to fights in he shelter area to PE accidents. It made him wonder how Serena could so quickly flick the switch between businiesswoman and mother. Not to mention that switch that she seemed to so easily flick between who he saw mere hours ago and who she was now in front of her daughter.

He ate mostly in silence, feeling slightly awkward at his intrusion while the logical part of his mind reminded him that, had he continued his course home, there was a high probability that he would have been hospitalised, or worse.

That awkwardness finally overcame him by about eight o'clock, not long after dinner, when he announced that he had had a long day and needed an early night. He knew how little time Serena got to share with Eleanor and he didn't want to impose on that. And it wasn't really a lie, anyway. Between the hours spent with Serena, the insane amount of work he had done in half the normal time and now the scare he had just experienced in his car, he really was drained.

He headed upstairs and, for what was probably the first time in his life, fell into bed fully dressed, so exhausted from today that he couldn't even be bothered to get out of his clothes.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me your thoughts!  
Sarah x**


	14. Chapter 14

**A/N: This is abnormally cushy, fluffy, cute and romantic for me, so please forgive me for that. Maybe my mind is too tired to come up with anything else; Mum bought another - yes, another - car. This one is quite modern, technological and computerised. Helping her understand it all will be a job and a half. Technology and my mother...it just doesn't work. Trust me.**

**Thanks again for all the kind reviews, as well! :D**

**Sarah x**

* * *

Hanssen heard Serena enter the bedroom at about ten o'clock; he didn't speak or even move, deciding to pretend he was still asleep so she could sleep too. He heard her in the bathroom, washing her face and brushing her teeth, taking her jewellery off, and he listened as she quietly rifled through the drawers looking for pyjamas.

He contemplated scaring the life out of her by speaking to her through the darkness but, though the idea was thoroughly amusing, he decided she had had enough frights for one day.

She carefully crawled into bed, lying with her back to him. He listened carefully for any sign that she wasn't OK, but none came. Instead, all he heard was her whisper, "I know you're awake." He could hear the smug grin in her voice when she added, "Your breathing changed when I came in."

He smiled to himself. She rolled over, her hands finding their way to his chest. "You're still in your work clothes?" she demanded, sounding rather shocked. "Henrik, you'll boil. It's bad enough with pyjamas. This house seems to trap heat at night," she explained.

"I'm fine," he answered her. Admittedly, he was overheating slightly. Perhaps going to bed in a suit wasn't his best plan ever.

"Honestly!" she argued.

"I'm perfectly alright," he lied to her.

"No," she asserted. "Come on. You must be so uncomfortable!"

He had to admit she was right; he had just fallen onto the bed with his clothes on because he was so tired, but he was now regretting it. "Right," she sighed. She unbuttoned his shirt before he could stop her. He tried to stop her throwing it on the floor but she beat him to it, her hands already on his belt by the time he moved.

Before he knew it, he was left in just his underwear, his clothes strewn on the floor somewhere. "What was the purpose of that exercise?" he demanded, trying to sound strict. He knew it wouldn't work but still he attempted it.

"I don't want you dying from heatstroke in my bed," she retorted. "I mean, how would it look to the police? Not to mention the coroner!"

He let out a gentle laugh and kissed her neck lightly. From what he could feel, she was wearing a cotton vest and shorts. She kissed him lightly on the lips and turned around again; he knew that if she felt anything like him, she felt like she could fall asleep and never wake up again.

He didn't know what she was feeling and he wouldn't pretend to. He reached out a hand and placed it softly on her arm; her skin was warm against his hand. He rubbed his thumb against her arm soothingly, feeling the tension in her body and realising that she was still uptight about everything.

The realisation hit him that, in the past week, he had made her relive the two most upsetting times in her life and he felt slightly guilty for it. It was quite unnerving to know that she was so troubled as a youngster. The last thing she came across as in adulthood was troubled. In that sense, she seemed to have overcome many of her issues.

He leaned forward and put his arms around her, slipped on between the bed and the curve of her waist. Holding her tight to him, he could almost feel her internally squeaking to herself at the fact he was being so tender. He didn't quite understand why everyone saw him as the loveless, frigid monster he knew he wasn't. He kissed the top of her head, smelling the scent of her shampoo in her short hair. There was something enticing about her, but it wasn't in the normal sense; she was interesting, and not to mention challenging.

He pressed his lips into her temple, feeling her smile against his face. Her hand drifted up to his face and her fingers lightly stroked his cheek. He trailed kisses down to her jaw; she started to stifle laughter. "Henrik," she warned him, her voice husky and low.

He ignored her and kissed down her neck and onto her shoulder. She wriggled slightly but his arms had too tight a hold on her for her to turn and get back at him as he knew she wanted to.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Being...nice?" he suggested. He started kissing her shoulder, moving back towards her neck this time. Part of it was that he wanted her to feel wanted because, for such a competent woman, her personal confidence seemed to be through the floor when she was in private. His lips were pressed against the crook of her neck when she finally let her sweet, girlish laugh escape.

He leaned over and left a trail of soft kisses between her jaw and her lips; there was a strange spark inside him when their lips met. He felt her smile into his mouth and moved away from the kiss, his lips against her cheekbone.

His lips hit her temple again, and then her forehead; her skin wrinkled against his lips slightly as she smiled. This was what he had want – for her to smile. And for her to let him be so free and casual with her. He kissed her nose lightly and she burst into fits of quiet laughter. He smiled and relented, retreating to bury his face in her hair again for a moment.

"Mmm...smothering me in kisses. I think that's a bit beyond being nice," she giggled. What he was actually doing was reminding her someone wanted her, and unwind her, but he wasn't going to tell her. He just smiled into her hair. Her hands drifted down to fall on top of his. "Why aren't you frightened?" she asked.

"Why would I be frightened?" he replied, slightly confused.

"The...the scars," she explained. "When my ex-husband first saw them, he didn't touch me for weeks. I could tell he was frightened by it."

"With all due respect, Serena," Henrik sighed, "he didn't ask about your nightmares, he didn't ask about the scars and instead was visibly disgusted by it, and he never once told you you are beautiful. Your ex-husband is starting to come across as a bit of an idiot."

"Oh, he _is_ an idiot," she assured him. "But we're not talking about him. We're talking about you, and the fact you haven't run away from the insane woman with all the ugly scars, because he didn't even know where they came from and he hated having to look at it."

"You're not insane and your scars aren't ugly," he immediately replied. He didn't care how many times he had to say it, but he was determined to make her believe it. "And I'm not stupid enough to be frightened by a few scars. Alright?" He felt her nod her head. "Good."

"I don't understand," she said. Her doubt was relentless. Part of Henrik just wanted to shake her and shout at her that he didn't care if she was scarred.

"What is there to misunderstand?" She really could be quite unfathomable at times. What part of him not particularly minding that she was scarred was so difficult to comprehend?

"How can you be so calm?" she demanded. "How can you keep so level headed all the time? I would have slapped me today if I were you. I know I must have annoyed you with the silent treatment," she admitted. At least she knew she had been frustrating today.

"Yes, it did irritate me," he confirmed. "But I can see beyond blind fury. I knew there was a reason for your reaction and I wanted to know what that reason was," he explained. "And a mutual friend of ours told me to ask the question and accept the answer, no matter what it was," he added.

"Who?"

"If I told you that, I'd have to kill you," he teased. "The important thing is that I asked the question, I got an answer, and I accepted that answer for what it was. I can't change it, and I can't go back in time and stop you from doing it in the first place. That just leaves acceptance."

"How is it possible for logic to be confusing?" she sighed.

"It's entirely possible if an illogical person tries to understand it," he grinned. She elbowed his ribs gently, making him groan quietly. He should have seen that one coming.

"I am not illogical!" she said childishly. "You're just _too_ logical," she added.

"Am I really?" He kissed her bare shoulder and tightened the grip his arms had around her body; he knew she was smiling now.

"Yes," she insisted. "Even when you're thinking in reverse, it's still a straight line. Most people can't do that, you know," she informed him, her voice slightly accusatory.

"So my logic is abnormal?" he concluded for her. He had never considered that ability as abnormal before; he had always assumed that everyone was capable of logic if they put their minds to it but clearly he had been mistaken.

"Definitely."

"That's handy to know," he smirked into the crook of her neck. He felt her body relaxing in his arms; the plan to help her relax after her stressful day was working. There was silence for a few minutes as he just let her fall into him. Her whole body was leaning back into his.

She turned her head slightly and smiled, throwing it lazily back onto the pillow. "Thank you," she sighed. "For everything. For today."

"You're more than welcome," he replied. "Now, don't you think it's time to get some sleep?"

"If I wasn't so exhausted, I would have had other ideas," she answered him, the wickedness heavy in her voice once more. "But I could barely walk in a straight line coming up the stairs, so..." she trailed off. He smiled and squeezed her tight. "'Night," she mumbled.

"Goodnight," he said, briefly pressing his face into her hair. She gave a soft moan of appreciation before her breathing started to slow down. He found it odd that her nightmare hadn't come back. Not in his presence, at least. Perhaps since she had opened up about it, her mind had let her rest a little from it. Maybe her subconscious knew he was there and knew that he actually cared what it all meant.

She was one of the strangest women he had come across. Beauty, brains, ambition, a bad temper, a tendency to be reckless...and yet there was this softness about her. When he was sure she had fallen asleep, he kissed her neck lightly and settled to sleep himself.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to leave a review and tell me what you thought of it!  
Sarah x**


	15. Chapter 15

**A/N: Sorry this took so long to update! I don't know if I like this chapter very much, but uploaded it anyway because I'm sick of re-writing it. Thanks for all your reviews!**

**Sarah x**

* * *

When Henrik woke the next morning, it was with amusement but very little surprise that he found her curled up against his body, her face yet again buried in his chest. His hand was on the back of her head, cradling it into his chest, and an arm was draped around her body loosely. Somehow in their slumber they had become entangled in each other's grasp. Never in a million years had he thought this possible.

He kissed her head and untangled himself from her; he was showered and dressed in last night's clothes after half an hour. And then he remembered. The car was dangerous. He looked at his watch and realised it was only half-past seven.

His almost obsessive need to know the answer behind everything was beginning to tempt him to get the trolley jack out of the boot and see if he could see the problem. He heard footsteps on the stairs and guessed either Serena or Eleanor was just getting up and made a hasty decision to investigate.

Closing the door silently behind him, he unlocked the car and made for the boot. He jacked the car up, starting at the front passenger side. He lay flat on the hard ground, against his better judgement, and looked for a problem.

He didn't know very much about the subject but he would have known if something was seriously amiss – some things were blindingly obvious.

There was nothing snapped, which was encouraging. He lay there and thought for a few minutes, trying to find an answer for it. He leaned up slightly to get himself from under the car but a voice made him start and he felt his head hitting metal with sharp pain.

"Henrik, you _idiot_," a voice he knew to be Serena's drawled. "You don't go under a car that's only held up on a jack. It's asking for trouble."

He groaned and pulled himself out from under the car, rubbing his head gingerly. He glanced up to find Serena in a dressing gown and slippers, holding two mugs. "Oh, does Mr. Hanssen have a little owie?" she asked in her best baby voice. He glared at her but repressed a smile when she knelt down, handed him his mug and kissed the spot on his head he had been rubbing. "Now. If we're going to find what's wrong with your hunk of metal then I suggest we do it properly and _safely_," she said sternly, with that look even he knew not to argue with.

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Axle stands," she grinned. "There should be two in the shed."

She smiled impishly up at him when he got to his feet; he let his fingers trail in her hair as he passed.

The switch had flipped again, he realised as he went in the shed. She wasn't vulnerable today; at least she didn't appear to be. She was just Serena this morning. Nothing more, nothing less.

When he returned, he was surprised to find Serena on all fours, ducking to see under the car without putting herself in danger. She seemed to sense his approach and stood up, silently taking the axle stands from him. He watched as she knowingly placed one under the sill of the raised side and lowered the car slowly and very nearly silently.

She jacked the other side up and repeated it to the same height; he didn't know how she knew what she was doing but he admired her swift motions with an inward smirk. She crawled under and started to look over the passenger said steering. Not to feel like a moron, Henrik mirrored her on the driver's side.

After about a minute of feeling around, he heard a triumphant noise from beside him. "Ah-hah!" Serena exclaimed. She told him, "Go and turn the engine," with what he knew was an affectionate and absent-minded pat on his flat stomach.

"With you under here?" he asked. "I don't think so."

"Don't be silly! It's fine if it's on axle stands," she insisted. "Go on!" He gave her a soft glare but reluctantly got to his feet and opened the door, making sure the car was in neutral before turning the engine on. "Come here!" she called. He sighed and went down and lay next to her. Teasing her, he kissed her neck lightly. She smiled but scolded him, "There's a time and a place, Henrik, and lying underneath a running car isn't one of them."

"Oh, I don't know," he retorted. "There is something rather attractive about Serena Campbell, in pyjamas, under a car," he smirked. "Right. What have you found?"

"That," she pointed at the control arm, "is a wishbone, and it shouldn't be moving like that." He saw it shuddering back and forth and looked around to the driver's side; the identical component on that side was solid. "It'll be the ball joint loose, too, which means the tracking will be here, there and everywhere," she explained over the engine. "Explains why your car tried to kill you last night."

He gave her a look demanding an explanation for her knowledge. "In light of what happened to my dad, I grew up wanting to feel safe driving which, to me, entailed some degree of knowing how a car works," she explained to him. He said nothing to her, only giving her a tiny understanding smile.

She gave him a smile and got up. He was still half-lying there when she turned the engine off, slightly dazed by what she had just displayed. He himself got up and waited while she took over, letting the car down again with very little noise. She bent over and picked their mugs off the pavement, handing him his and wrapping an arm around his waist as they headed back inside.

In the kitchen they found Eleanor making toast, and Serena hastily severed physical contact with Henrik, but Eleanor's eyes were quicker than Serena had credited her with. "Jesus," the girl side, smoothing her school blazer gently, "you're already like an old married couple."

"Hey!" Serena protested. "Less of the _old_, thank you very much!" Eleanor just smirked while Hanssen felt rather awkward; he did not like to be the source of tension between Serena and her daughter. Henrik sat down at the kitchen table when Serena left to get changed, a silence between himself and Eleanor he found tense.

She sat down opposite him and quietly started on her toast and tea, smirking to herself.

"I'm not a baby," she asserted quietly. "I'm not an idiot, either."

"Nobody says you are, as far as I'm aware," he replied. She looked up at him and smiled.

"You're the first man she's taken home in years," he informed her.

"She didn't take me home," he contradicted her. "I came here because I deemed it safer than attempting the longer journey to my own home in a car that seems to have a mind of its own at the present moment."

Eleanor grinned and leaned over to him, her hand closed. "Judging by where I found these hoovering Mum's room the other night," she said, dropping two shirt buttons and a cufflink onto his palm, "she must have pretty much ripped your clothes off when I was over at Gabby's."

Henrik immediately felt the blood rush to his cheek and he knew his face was turning red. He had known they were missing; he just hadn't counted on Serena's daughter finding them. "The one time I do as Mum says and hoover upstairs, I find out she's had a man home."

"How did you know it was me?" he asked, resigned to the fact there was no keeping it from her anymore.

She gave a small smile before she answered him. "The way she looked at you last night." She looked at her phone and added, "I'm going to school now; got to collect Gabby along the way. Tell Mum, will you?" she asked.

"Of course," he smiled.

"Thanks," she replied, picking up her bag and sauntering out the door, leaving Henrik, for the second time this morning, rather perplexed.

Before he knew what was happening, he was in the passenger seat and Serena was driving to his house so he could get changed. Serena, he was quickly discovering, moved like a tornado, as did her daughter. He had not expected his morning to be so lively.

"Go on," Serena said.

"What?"

"Spill," she ordered him, glancing quickly around at him. "What's eating Mr. Hanssen?"

"Eleanor knows," he informed her matter-of-factly, no emotion or worry tainting his voice. "She found my shirt buttons and cufflink when she was vacuuming in your bedroom. And apparently, you look at me in a certain way," he added, knowing that would unsettle her when she started to smirk. It was a smirk that rapidly faded upon being informed she had an obvious weakness for him.

He got out when she reached his house. To his surprise, she didn't wait for an invitation; she followed him into the house. She wandered off to the kitchen – no doubt to raid his cupboards for breakfast – while he headed upstairs.

He looked out a suit and took his shoes and socks off. He sat cross-legged on the bed and regained his mental equilibrium, having had his lover and her daughter knock it out of him in quick succession. It occurred to him he had just got himself very much involved with Serena by confirming her child's suspicions.

"What's up?" Serena asked again as she walked in eating a chocolate chip cookie.

"Cookies for breakfast, Serena?" he retorted, dodging the subject of his worries. "That is very healthy." She just shrugged, her stony face silently demanding he spit out his concerns to her. He sighed and explained, "It's just me being difficult."

She came to stand in front of him, and he looked up at her. "In what way?"

"I feel like I'm beginning to intrude on your life," he admitted. "You have a daughter."  
"Who is well beyond the age of having to tiptoe around," she reminded him. She joined him on the bed, kicking off her shoes. "Look, Henrik. You're not a man of a million words. I know that. But if something bothers you about us then you need to tell me before we get too deep into all of this. I don't want either of us hurt," she warned him.

He held in the smile at this and replied, "I am not having second thoughts. I just don't like the idea of coming between you and your child."

Serena laughed his worry away when she replied to him. "Do you know how long she's been telling me to get a man?" she laughed. "Henrik, you're not coming between us. Our relationship can be strained," she admitted, "but she wants the best for me, as I do her. You will never come between us," she assured him with a kiss.

He smiled gently in acceptance; that smile turned into a grin when she knelt up and pushed him backwards onto the bed. She kissed him gently and he returned it with a shot of heated passion running through him. Instinctively, he pulled her close as she deepened their kiss. "We're most definitely going to be late for work," he breathed a reminder to her.

She smiled into his lips and answered, "All of a sudden I don't feel well. I think I may oversleep."

He laughed gently, kissing her warm neck as he pulled her blouse off. "I don't have a car and may just have to wait on someone on the same route giving me a lift."

"Too bad she overslept," she finished concocting their excuses for being late, pulling off his shirt and kissing his chest lightly.

She trailed kisses up his bare chest and throat to his mouth, and he said to her, "You need to set a louder alarm, Ms. Campbell."

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please feel free to review and tell me your thoughts!  
Sarah x**


End file.
